COLUMBIA   UNIVERSITY  STUDIES   IN   ENGLISH 
AND   COMPARATIVE   LITERATURE 


ENGLISH  CHILDHOOD 


COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 

Columbia    University 
New    York 


SALES  AGENTS 

LONDON 

HUMPHREY    MILFORD 
Amen  Corner,  E.C. 


SHANGHAI 

EDWARD  EVANS  &  SONS,  Ltd. 
30    North    Szechuen    Road 


English  Childhood 

Wordsworth's  Treatment  of  Childhood 
in  the  Light  of  English   Poetry 

from 

Prior  to  Crabbe 


By 
A.    CHARLES   BABENROTH 


Submitted  in  Partial  Fulfilment  of  the  Requirements 

for  the  Degree  of  Doctor  of  Philosophy,  in  the 

Faculty  of  Philo>sophy,  Columbia  University 


Nrm  fork 

COLUMBIA  UNIVERSITY  PRESS 
1922 


Copyright,    1922 
By  Com'Mhia  L'niversitv  Press 


Printed    from    type.     Published    December.    1021; 


NOItTinVIOSTKKN   PUBLISHING    HOUSE 

Mii-WArKi:i:.  wis.,  u.  s.  a. 


H22- 


TO 
MY  SON  DONALD 


t*  O  «>  <  t  "^  T^ 


PREFACE 

The  following  essays  are  based  on  a  dissertation  pre- 
sented for  the  doctorate  in  Columbia  University.  The  aim 
has  been  to  present  Wordsworth's  rather  extensive  body  of 
poetry  on  childhood  in  its  true  perspective  against  the  back- 
ground of  eighteenth-century  poetry. 

In  addition  to  many  detached  poems  on  childhood  I  have 
used  innumerable  interesting  lines  imbedded  in  poems  on 
subjects  remotely  or  not  at  all  connected  with  childhood. 
Such  incidental  lines,  in  addition  to  their  occasional  charm, 
are  essential  for  an  understanding  of  the  attitude  of  poets 
of  the  eighteenth  century  toward  childhood. 

I  owe  thanks  to  the  Librarian  of  Columbia  University 
and  to  Miss  Mudge  of  the  library  staff  for  assistance  in 
procuring  books  and  manuscripts ;  to  my  wife,  for  careful 
reading  of  proof;  to  Professor  W.  P.  Trent  and  Professor 
E.  H.  Wright,  who  read  several  of  the  essays;  and  es- 
pecially to  Professor  C.  S.  Baldwin,  who  read  the  entire 
manuscript  and  made  constructive  suggestions  of  inesti- 
mable value. 

The  essays  had  their  inception  in  the  English  Seminar 
conducted  by  Professor  Ashley  Horace  Thorndike,  whose 
wide  scholarship  has  been  at  the  same  time  an  inspiration 
and  an  invaluable  guide  in  shaping  the  discussion  of  the 
large  body  of  material  which  represents  the  accumulated 
effort  of  a  century  on  the  subject  of  childhood.  To  him  I 
am  deeply  grateful  for  countless  suggestions,  always  pa- 
tiently and  kindly  given. 

A.  C.  B. 
New  York, 
November  7,  1922. 
vii 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

Introduction i 

I.    In   Our  Infancy 15 

II.    The  Growing  Boy 50 

III.  Children  of  the  Poor 97 

IV.  Education 161 

V.     Children's  Books 219 

VI.    William   Blake 262 

VII.    William  Wordsworth 299 

Index 397 


ENGLISH  CHILDHOOD 

INTRODUCTION 

The  aim  in  the  following  chapters  is  to  study  Words- 
worth's treatment  of  childhood  in  the  light  of  English  poetry 
from  Matthew  Prior  to  George  Crabbe.  For  a  true  appre- 
ciation of  Wordsworth's  attitude  it  is  essential  to  know 
the  place  of  childhood  in  the  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century. 

It  is  not  the  intention  to  review  juvenile  literature.  The 
object  is  not  to  evaluate  poetry  composed  by  children  or  for 
them.  No  peculiar  value  is  attached  to  the  precocious  verse 
of  Pope,  Chatterton,  or  Wordsworth  himself.  In  fact,  un- 
less their  precocious  verse  incorporates  lines  on  childhood, 
it  has  no  place  within  the  limits  of  this  study. 

In  the  eighteenth  century  may  be  observed  the  beginnings 
of  many  modern  conceptions  in  poetry  as  well  as  in  politics, 
theology,  education^  and  social  welfare.  This  is  especially 
true  with  respect  to  interest  in  childhood.  In  order  to' 
understand  the  poet's  treatment  of  childhood  in  an  age  of 
changing  values,  it  is  necessary  to  take  into  account  various 
influences  that  made  themselves  felt  in  the  lives  and  thoughts 
of  English  men  and  women  as  well  as  in  English  poetry. 
Earliest  of  these  is  Locke's  ^'am^^  Thoughts  Concerning 
Education,  which  persists  as  a  moulding  force  throughout 
the  century  wherever  the  education  of  children  is  discussed. 
Shaftesbury's  Characteristics  is  a  definite  influence  from 
Thomson  to  Wordsworth.  After  the  middle  of  the  century 
there  are  traces,  often  tangible,  of  ideas  which  derive  from 
Rousseau's  Emile;  and  the  effects  of  Revolutionary  specu- 
lation and  social  philosophy  on  the   conceptions   of  Blake 


2  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

are  obvious  in  liis  poems  about  children.  The  industrial 
revolution,  moreover,  offered  new  problems  with  regard  to 
child  lalx)r,  problems  akin  to  those  noticed  in  poetry  as 
early  as  John  Dyer's  The  Fleece.  The  problem,  then,  is  not 
merely  literary.  In  so  far  as  poets  have  touched  upon 
education  and  social  welfare  it  will  be  helpful  for  an  un- 
derstanding of  their  aims  to  observe  the  conflict  between 
old  and  new  forces,  and  the  emergence  of  modern  concep- 
tions in  the  schools  and  in  the  attitude  of  the  public  toward 
children. 

Certain  themes  that  are  prominent  in  Wordsworth 
emerge  faintly  at  first  in  the  w^ork  of  minor  poets  who  are 
seldom  read  now  except  by  students  of  literature.  These 
igties  minor es,  in  whose  poetry  there  is  not  often  grandeur 
or  height,  indicate  more  or  less  clearly  the  changes  that 
took  place  in  life  and  in  poetry.  The  student  can  not,  like 
Burns,  pass  by  "hunders  nameless"  poets  and  versifiers  who 
imitated  their  betters,  but  who  prepared  the  way  at  the  same 
time  for  inspired  poets  like  Blake  and  Wordsworth.  Their 
poetry  is  vital  in  a  study  that  reflects  forces  which  ultimate- 
ly brought  about  epoch-making  changes  in  the  attitude  of 
men  towards  children  in  the  home,  in  the  school,  and  in 
industry. 

I      - 

Although  no  hard-and-fast  delimitation  of  the  years  that 
constitute  childhood  is  necessary  for  the  purpose  of  this 
study,  it  will  be  helpful  to  observe  the  ages  of  children  as 
stated  by  men  of  letters  themselves.  Age  is  sometimes 
specifically  noted  in  the  title,  as  in  Prior's  To  A  Child  of 
Quality  (five  years  old,  i/Oj,  the  author  then  forty).  More 
often  the  poet  merely  alludes  to  the  child's  age,  with  the 
result  tliat  it  is  difficult  to  determine  the  exact  boundaries 
set    for    infancy,    childhood,    or   youth.    Cowper's    To    My 


INTRODUCTION  3 

Cousin  Anne  Bodhani  recalls  her  as  no  more  "Than  play- 
thing for  a  nurse" ;  she  was  "A  kitten  both  in  size  and  glee." 
While  comparing  the  ages  of  children  in  The  Excursion 
(III,  592-94),  Wordsworth  states  that  there  was 

no  wider  interval  of  time 
Between  their  several  births   than   served   for  one 
To  establish  something  of  a  leader's  sway. 

The  line  between  infancy  and  childhood  is  usually  vaguely 
suggested,  as  in  The  Excursion,  by  stating  that  the  boy  had 
"overpast  the  sinless  age."  Beattie  is  not  specific  in  the 
prefatory  remarks  to  The  Minstrel:  his  "design  was  to  trace 
the  progress  of  a  Poetical  Genius,  born  in  a  rude  age,  from 
the  first  dawning  of  fancy  and  reason  till  that  period  at 
which  he  may  be  supposed  capable  of  appearing  in  the 
world  as  a  Minstrel." 

The  paragraphs  of  Isaac  Watts  in  the  first  half  and  those 
of  Rousseau  after  the  middle  of  the  century  make  it  pos- 
sible to  construct  a  schedule  of  ages.  For  Watts  the  years 
up  to  four  constituted  infancy;  from  four  to  eight,  early 
childhood;  from  eight  to  twelve,  childhood;  and  after  that, 
youth.  Rousseau  carried  infancy  to  the  fifth  year;  child- 
hood to  the  twelfth ;  boyhood  to  the  fifteenth ;  and  youth  to 
the  twentieth  year. 

In  Birth  and  Education  of  Genius,  James  Cawthom  ap- 
proximates Watts's  age  of  four  as  closing  the  period  of 
infancy : 

And  Genius  now  'twixt  three  and  four, 
Phoebus,  according  to  the  rule, 
Resolved  to  send  his  son  to  school. 

Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  holds  closer  to  Rousseau's 
age  of  five:  at  the  age  when  Luke  carried  in  his  cheeks 
"Two  steady  roses  that  were  five  years  old,"  Michael  first 


4  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

made  a  shepherd's  staff  for  him.  Aaron  Hill's  The  Dis- 
tinction of  Ages  had  carried  the  first  period  up  to  the  seventh 
year : 

The  seven  first  years  of  life  (man's  break  of  day), 
Gleams  of  short  sense,  a  dawn  of  thought  display. 

The  ninth  year  was  frequently  chosen  as  the  close  of 
childhood.  Swift  states  in  the  Modest  Proposal'.  '1  have 
no  children  hy  which  I  can  propose  to  get  a  single  penny, 
the  youngest  l^eing  nine  years  old."  Richardson  wrote  in 
Clarissa  Harlowe:  "She  never  was  left  out  of  any  party  of 
pleasure  after  she  had  passed  her  ninth  year."  In  one  of 
the  numerous  letters  in  which  he  shows  a  true  fatherly 
tenderness  for  his  son  Philip  Stanhope,  Chesterfield  reminds 
the  boy  of  his  ninth  birthday,  after  which  he  will  no  longer 
be  a  child.  Wordsworth  is  less  precise  in  The  Prelude.  He 
speaks  of  himself  as  "a  child  not  nine  years  old,"  and  many 
of  his  recollections  cluster  about  the  period  between  nine 
and  ten  in  phrases  like  "Ere  I  had  told  ten  birthdays,"  ''twice 
five  summers,"  and  "twice  five  years  or  less."  In  Michael 
the  tenth  year  marks  a  period ;  at  that  age,  when  Luke  was 
"full  ten  years  old"  and  was  able  to  stand  against  the  moun- 
tain blasts,  Michael  and  his  son  were  companions. 

Although  it  is  clear  that  they  were  using  the  word 
"childhood"  without  strict  regard  for  age,  there  is  no  real 
inconsistency  among  poets  in  their  notice  of  these  varying 
ages  as  markers  of  infancy  and  childhood.  Modern  child 
psychology  holds  that  "childhood  is  usually  considered  to 
cover  the  period  between  infancy  and  puberty,  or,  roughly, 
between  the  ages  of  3  and  12";  but  it  also  recognizes  an 
overlapping  of  jxTiods  when  tests  are  applied  to  determine 
physical,   emotional,   or   intellectual    development.^    In    the 

»  A  Cyclopedia  of  Education,  edited  by  Paul  Monroe,  s.  v. 
"Child  Psychology." 


INTRODUCTION  5 

lines  recalling  his  boyhood  friend,  Wordsworth  felt  free 
to  change  the  reading  of  1805,  "ere  he  was  ten  years  old",  to 

This  boy  was  taken  from  his  mates,  and  died 

In  childhood,  ere  he  was  full  twelve  years  old.  ^ 

While  discussing  charity  children  in  his  History  of  the 
^Poor  (1793),  Thomas  Ruggles  seems  to  suggest  that  thir- 
teen or  fourteen  was  considered  the  close  of  childhood,  at 
which  time  the  boy  was  expected  to  go  to  work.  Mickle 
refers  to  this  transition  in  Commodore  Johnstone : 

As  childhood  closed,  thy  ceaseless  toils  began, 
And  toils  and  dangers  ripened  thee  to  man. 

Transition  seems  to  be  indicated  by  Aaron  Hill  in  The  Dis- 
tinction of  Ages : 

When    fourteen    springs    have    bloomed    his    downy    cheek. 
His  soft  and  blushful  meanings  learn  to  speak. 

In  Ecclesiastical  Sonnets  (III,  23)  Wordsworth  gives 
solemn  expression  to  his  regret  that  childhood  can  not  be 
extended  beyond  the  age  of  Confirmation. 

The   Young-ones   gathered   in   from   hill   and   dale, 

With  holiday  delight  on  every  brow: 

'Tis  past  away;  far  other  thoughts  prevail; 

For  they  are  taking  the  baptismal  Vow 

Upon  their  conscious  selves;  their  own  lips  speak 

The  solemn  promise.     Strongest  sinews  fail. 

And  many  a  blooming,  many  a  lovely,  cheek 

Under  the  holy  fear  of  God  turns  pale; 

While  on  each  head  his  lawn-robed  servant  lays 

An  apostolic  hand,  and  with  prayer  seals 

1  See  There  zcas  a  Boy   (1798),  in  Knight,  Poems  of  William 
Wordsworth,  Macmillan,  1896,  vol.  II,  page  58,  footnote. 


6  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  Covenant.    The  Omnipotent  will  raise 
Their  feeble  Souls;  and  bear  with  his  regrets. 
Who,  looking  round  the  fair  assemblage,  feels 
That  ere  the  Sun  goes  down  their  childhood  sets.  ^ 

II 

Although  tlie  lines  of  Catullus,  Martial,  and  Horace  on 
childhood  are  echoed  in  English  poetry  from  Ben  Jonson 
to  Pope  and  Gray,  the  limits  of  this  study  forbid  even  a 
brief  survey  of  childhood  as  it  is  noted  in  the  Greek  and 
Latin  literatures.  It  would,  likewise,  be  impossible  to  do 
justice  to  memorable  passages  in  the  Old  and  the  New 
Testament,  and  to  the  many  beautiful  medieval  lyrics  of 
the  Virgin  and  Child,  the  spirit  of  which  is  more  or  less 
faithfully  preserved  in  such  anonymous  songs  of  universal 
ai)peal  to  the  mother  heart  as  My  Sweet  Szveeting,  or  Liilly, 
lulla,  thou  little  ti)iy  child,  and  the  homely  lyric 

Fayre    niaydyn,   who   is   this   barn, 
That   thou   beriste   in   thyn   arme? 

Neither  does  space  allow  even  a  glance  at  childhood  as  it  is 
frequently  noticed  elsewhere  in  Middle  English  literature, 
for  example  in  the  Rrome  miracle  play  Abraham  and  Isaac, 
in  Chaucer's  penetrating  lines,  and  in  the  Popular  Ballads. 

*  Compare  The  Act,  The  Preservation  of  the  Health  and  Morals 
of  Apprentices  and  Others  Employed  in  Cotton  and  Other  Mills, 
and  Cotton  and  Other  Factories :  June  22,  1802.  One  hour  each 
Sunday  should  be  given  to  teaching  the  Christian  religion,  and  Con- 
firmation should  take  place  between  the  fourteenth  and  eighteenth 
years.  It  seems  clear  that  Confirmation  has  been  delayed  beyond  the 
usual  age  of  twelve  or  fourteen,  probably  because  of  industrial 
abuses  of  child  labor.  Schedule  C  of  the  Act,  for  better  regulation 
of  parish  poc)r  children  within  bills  of  mortality,  passed  in  1766, 
shows  that  children  were  at  work  as  early  as  the  age  of  six.  It 
specifies:  "Where  sent  if  past  Six  Years  of  Age,  and  in  what  work 
employed." 


INTRODUCTION  7 

It  is,  however,  necessary  to  glance  at  the  poetn^  of  the 
seventeenth  century.  The  appeahng  child  lyrics  in  the 
period  from  the  Earl  of  Surrey's  The  Age  of  Cliildren 
Happiest  to  Henry  Vaughan's  The  Retreate  have  no  paral- 
lels at  the  close  of  the  seventeenth  century. 

Surrey's  pensive  mood  does  not  prevent  a  frankly  human 
approach  to  his  subject.  Sir  Philip  Sidney's  Child-Song 
is  not  colored  by  moral  or  theological  intentions:  Sidney's 
attitude  toward  the  infant  who  can  not  sleep,  although  his 
mother  sings  to  him,  is  almost  whimsical  and,  certainly, 
human.  Nicholas  Breton's  A  Sweet  Lullaby  with  rare 
grace  and  beauty  depicts  a  mother  tenderly  singing  to  her 
child  about  the  father  who  "false  is  fled  away."  Robert 
Greene's  Sephestia's  Song  to  Her  Child  (from  Menaphon) 
has  all  the  charm,  tender  humanity,  and  lilt  of  Elizabethan 
lyrics  on  childhood. 

Much  of  the  charm  of  these  lyrics  survives  in  Jonson's 
child  poems,  which,  however,  begin  to  show  traces  of  new 
literary  methods  characteristic  of  the  classicist  school. 
Although  his  lyrics  reveal  a  conscious  striving  for  formal 
beauty,  Jonson  is  still  close  to  the  Elizabethan  mood.  His 
lines  On  My  First  Daughter,  On  My  First  Son,  and  An 
Epitaph  on  Salathiel  Pavy  breathe  true  parental  tenderness. 
In  these  poems  the  personal  attitude  allows  the  expression 
of  genuine  sentiments.  The  last  line  of  the  poem  on  his 
daughter  echoes  a  classical  convention,  but  the  father's  heart 
is  in  the  poem.  For  so  genuine  an  expression  of  parental 
grief  as  is  found  in  the  lines  On  My  First  Son,  the  reader 
of  poetry  must  wait  more  than  one  hundred  years  after 
Jonson.  ^ 

1  Compare  On  the  Loss  of  an  Only  Son  Robert  Marquis  of  Nor- 
manhy,  by  John  Sheffield  Duke  of  Buckinghamshire. 


8  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Several  of  Robert  Herrick's  lyrics  combine  with  the 
exquisite  form  of  Jonson's  poems  a  sympathetic  insight 
not  to  be  found  in  verse  at  the  close  of  the  century.  The 
fomi  and  diction  of  his  Epitaph  Upon  A  Child  and  Upon  A 
Child  that  Dyed  recall  his  master  Jonson.  A  Grace  for  A 
Child  is  characterized  by  six)ntaneous  simplicity/  Her- 
rick's To  His  Saviour,  A  Child;  A  Present,  By  A  Child, 
without  losing  sight  of  the  human  child,  adds  something  of 
the  mystic  fervor  and  spiritual  suggestion  common  in  the 
most  inspired  passages  on  childhood  in  the  seventeenth 
centur}'.  This  element  had  already  appeared  in  the  well 
known  Burning  Babe  of  Southwell.  The  most  exalted  ex- 
pression of  the  mystic  longing  for  childhood  days  and 
moods  is  found  in  Henry  Vaughan's  The  Retreate. 

Happy  those  early  days  when  I 

Shined   in  my  angel-infancy. 

Before  I  understood  this  place 

Appointed  for  my  second  race, 

Or  taught  my  soul  to  fancy  aught 

But  a  white,  celestial  thought; 

When  yet  I  had  not  walked  above 

A  mile  or  two  from  my  first  love, 

And  looking  back — at  that  short  space — 

Could   see  a   glimpse   of  His  bright   face.  .  .  . 

With  these  immortal  lines  should  be  associated  the  para- 
grajih  penned  by  Bishop  Earle  in  his  Microcosmographie : 
"A  child  is  a  man  in  a  small  letter.  His  soul  is  yet  a  white 
paper   unscribbled   with   observations   of   the   world.    .    .    . 

1  Here  a  little  child  I   stand. 
Heaving  up  my  either  hand; 
Cold  as  paddocks  though  they  be, 
Here  I  lift  them  up  to  thee, 
For  a   bcnizon   to   fall 
On  our  meat,  and  on  us  all.     Amen. 


INTRODUCTION  V 

He  is  purely  happy,  because  he  knows  no  evil.  .  .  .  Hee 
kisses  and  loves  all.  And,  when  the  smart  of  the  rod  is 
past,  smiles  on  his  bearer.  The  elder  hee  grows  hee  is  a 
staire  lower  from  God.  Hee  is  the  Christian's  example, 
and  the  old  man's  relapse.  The  one  imitates  his  pureness, 
the  other  his  simplicity.  Could  hee  put  off  his  body  with 
his  little  coat,  hee  had  got  eternitie  without  a  burthen,  and 
exchanged  but  one  Heaven  for  another." 

On  the  one  hand  lyrics  of  the  Elizabethan  age  give 
frankly  human  and  vigorous  expression  to  themes  from 
childhood,  while  on  the  other  the  deep  insight  of  Vaughan 
and  Herrick  clothes  in  tender  lines  their  sense  of  ''some- 
thing more"  than  physical  reality.  Childhood  in  the  sense 
of  the  Elizabethan  singers  and  their  followers,  who  in 
Vaughan  carried  interpretation  to  its  highest  spiritual  pos- 
sibilities, disappears  from  English  poetry  until  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century  those  sentimental  poets  who  prepared  the 
way  for  Wordsworth  take  up  the  theme  again  haltingly. 

In  Crashaw's  Holy  Nativity  of  Our  Lord,  the  shepherds 
are  named  Tityrus  and  Thyrsis.  Milton's  On  the  Morning 
of  Christ's  Nativity  contains  allusions  to  Cynthia,  Apollo, 
and  Delphos,  and  On  the  Death  of  a  Fair  Infant  Dying  of 
a  Cough  to  Jove,  Elysian  fields,  and  Olympus.  In  these 
poems  the  tendency  away  from  direct  observation  of  chil- 
dren and  toward  classical  embellishment  is  as  clear  as  in 
Herrick's  The  Wounded  Cupid.  This  poem  reveals  those 
delightful  toyings  with  the  pagan  Cupid  which  were  to 
dominate  classicist  complimentary  verse  ostensibly  written 
on  the  theme  of  childhood. 

The  education  of  the  age  was  thoroughly  classical.  The 
poets  most  studied,  quoted,  and  imitated  were  those  of 
Greece  and  Rome.  While  exalting  the  classical  standard, 
men  of  letters  restricted  themselves  largely  to  the  methods 


10  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

employed  by  Horace  and  Virgil.  In  imitating  these  poets, 
they  aimed  to  use  subject-matter  susceptible  of  treatment  in 
the  manner  which  they  considered  classical.^ 

Poets  of  this  school  seldom  show  a  vital  conception  of 
childhood.  Waller  felt  it  necessary  to  justify  his  use  of 
English  in  the  epitaph  on  the  only  son  of  Lord  Andover; 
and  in  a  poem  On  English  Verse  he  writes  that  poets  who 
seek  a  lasting  reputation  must  carve  in  Latin  or  Greek. 
It  is  hardly  to  be  expected  that  poetry  conceived  in  such  a 
mood  will  reveal  a  lively  appreciation  of  children.  Waller's 
approach  was  artificial  when  he  wrote  that  in  the  starry 
night  fond  children  cry  for  "the  rich  spangles  that  adorn 
the  sky."  His  favorite  choice  of  theme  and  development 
is  typically  illustrated  in  St.  James  Park.  Children  do 
not  appear  in  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  lines  of  the  poem; 
but  a  thousand  cupids  ride  the  billows.  The  poem  repre- 
sents a  conception  in  which  human  childhood  can  have  no 
part.  The  subject  is  embroidered  with  classicalities  be- 
cause the  gallant  poet  is  interested  in  fine  compliments. 
Only  cupids,  the  spies  of  Thetis,  are  of  use  to  him. 

Abraham  Cowley,  who  helped  prepare  the  way  for  Dry- 
den,  and  enjoyed  a  reading  public  deep  into  the  eighteenth 
century,  also  reveals  tendencies  that  carried  poets  away  from 
the  Elizabethan  tradition.  As  his  classical  attainments  are 
closely  bound  up  with  his  school  life,  he  has  enshrined 
the  memory  of  his  teacher,  Mr.  Jordan,  second  master  at 
Westminster.  The  master's  virtues,  his  great  store  of 
learning,  and  his  simple  character  are  discerned  with  difficul- 

1  In  The  Complete  English  Gentleman  Defoe  satirizes  classi- 
calities: "Not  an  author  writes  a  pamphlet,  not  a  poet  a  copy  of 
verses,  no,  not  to  his  mistress,  tho  she  knows  nothing  of  the  matter, 
but  he  draws  a  bill  upon  Horace  or  Virgil  or  some  of  the  old 
chiming  train,  and  talks  as  familiarly  of  them  as  if  they  had  been 
brought  up  together." 


INTRODUCTION  11 

ty  among  generalizations  and  elaborations.  The  unwilling- 
ness of  the  classicists  to  treat  childhood  in  terms  of  common 
observation,  and  their  imitation  of  the  style  and  diction  of 
Latin  literature,  are  clearly  indicated  in  the  artificial  Happy 
Birth  of  the  Duke,  in  which  the  child  is  the  occasion  rather 
than  the  subject  of  the  poem.  There  is  a  clumsy  echo  like 
this: 

Time,  which  devours 
Its  own  sons,  will  be  glad  and  proud  of  yours. 

Stilted  phrases  mar  the  effusion,  which  might  have  been 
phrased  as  a  poem  of  simple,  unaffected  childhood,  for 
Cowley,  as  private  secretar}^  to  Queen  Henrietta  Maria 
during  her  exile,  was  intimately  acquainted  with  those  to 
whom  the  poem  is  addressed. 

Dryden's  most  appealing  lines  on  childhood  recall  at 
times  the  happy  phrasing  of  Jonson,  as  in  the  Pastoral  Elegy 
on  the  Death  of  Amyntas  and  Death  of  a  Very  Young' 
Gentleman.  His  beautiful  lines  in  the  latter  poem  reveal 
the  growing  tendency  to  treat  the  child  in  terms  of  man- 
hood. The  custom  of  magnifying  the  helpless  infant  into 
the  stature  of  a  man,  in  part  explained  by  the  particular 
subject,  is  manifest  in  certain  lines  of  Britannia  Rediviva. 

'Toetic  diction"  is  in  itself,  as  an  ideal  of  elegance,  un- 
favorable to  the  portrayal  of  childhood.  Addison's  Princess 
of  Wales  indicates  how  childhood  serves  merely  as  a  point 
of  departure  for  strained  compliments.  The  general  re- 
liance on  conventional  imagen-  is  obvious  in  a  poem  ad- 
dressed to  the  House  of  Nassau  by  John  Hughes,  who 
echoes  the  same  classical  parallel  Dryden  had  employed  in 
his  lines  to  the  Stuarts.  Addison's  Campaign  is  a  typical 
illustration  of  the  way  childhood  was  noticed  to  heighten 
effect  in  panegyrical  verse.  John  Philipps's  Blenheim  reads 
like  an  unconscious  satire  of  the  type.     In  the  passage  in 


12  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

which  Philipps  depicts  infant  suffering  to  heighten  the 
destructiveness  of  war,  the  situation  is  generahzed  and  the 
hues  are  crowded  with  pretentious  phrases. 

where  cities  stood, 
Well-fenced  and  numerous,  desolation  reigns 
And  emptiness :  dismayed,  unfed,  unhoused, 
The  widow  and  the  orphan  stroll  around 
The  desert  wide;  with  oft  retorted  eye 
They  view  the  gaping  walls  and  poor  remains 
Of  mansions  once  their  own,    (now   loathsome   haunts 
Of  birds  obscene),  bewailing  loud  the  loss 
Of  spouse,  or  sire,  or  son,  ere  manly  prime. 
Slain  in  sad  conflict,  and  complain  of  Fate 
As  partial  and  too  rigorous,  nor  find 
Where  to  retire  themselves,  or  whence  appease 
The  afflictive  keen  desire  for  food,  exposed 
To  winds  and  storms  and  jaws  of  savage  beasts. 

f  In  the  mood  of  the  classicists,  childhood  was  a  period  to 
be  rapidly  passed  over.  Like  Dryden,  Pope  also  employs 
the  rapid  generalized  summary  of  infancy  and  childhood.^ 
Until  he  reaches  the  state  of  manhood  in  his  summary.  Pope 
is  not  interested  in  details.  The  first  two  lines  rapidly 
carry  the  reader  over  the  period  of  infancy,  and  the  couplet 
on  childhood  is  noncommittal  as  to  details. 

Pope's  Messiah  was  written  in  imitation  of  Virgil's  Pol- 
Ho.  References  to  infancy  are  uninspired.  In  Pope's  lines 
the  child  becomes  an  "auspicious  babe"  and  ''smiling  in- 
fant" who  will  play  with  the  "crested  basilisk  and  speckled 
snake."  It  will  look  with  pleasure  upon  the  "green  lustre" 
of  the  scales,  and  will  innocently  play  with  the  "forky 
tongue."     Such  elaborated  accessories  are  out  of  harmony 

1  The  classicists  were  undoubtedly  indebted  to  a  passage  in 
Horace's  Ars  Poetica  for  this.  See  Roscommon's  translation.  But 
note  also  the  speech  of  Jaques  in  As  You  Like  It. — Essay  on  Man. 


INTRODUCTION  13 

witli  childhood.^  In  fact,  Pope  was  temperamentally  not 
fitted  for  the  task  of  phrasing  such  a  situation  with  Old 
Testament  simplicity.  Homely  surroundings  were  not  con- 
genial to  his  powers.  "He  had  been  at  his  best  in  the 
speeches  of  the  Iliad,  and  groaned  heavily  over  the  homely 
scenes  in  Ithaca."  Wordsworth  cited  Pope's  Messiah  as 
an  illustration  of  reprehensible  diction. 

Certain  passages  in  John  Gay's  Trivia  (1716)  reveal  a 
close  approach  to  realistic  observation  of  childhood.  Yet 
even  here  Gay  finds  it  necessary  to  use  the  machinery  of 
classical  mythology.  He  traces  the  parentage  and  "secret 
rise"  of  the  "sable  race"  know^n  as  London  bootblacks. 
While  writing  of  the  "tide  wdiose  sable  streams  beneath  the 
city  glide"  he  elaborates  the  legend  of  the  goddess  Cloacina. 
She  fell  in  love  with  a  London  streetsweeper  and  gave  birth 
to  a  child  who  "through  various  risks,  in  years  improved." 
Then  follow^s  a  brief  account  of  the  first  years  in  the  life  of 
a  London  waif,  with  minute  details  of  Holborn  life,  w^hich 
as  far  as  they  go  rival  in  vividness  the  circumstantial  ac- 
count in  Defoe's  Colancl  Jacques.  The  little  waif's  mother 
finally  persuades  the  gods  to  take  the  foundling's  part  and  to 
teach  him  a  useful  trade.  Diana  furnishes  a  brush  made  of 
the  "strong  bristles  of  the  mighty  boar."  The  god  of  day 
provides  a  tripod  "amid  the  crowded  way  to  raise  the  dirty 
foot."  Neptune  contributes  "fetid  oil  pressed  from  the 
enormous  whale,"  and  Vulcan  "aids  with  soot  the  new 
japanning  art."  As  Cloacina  descends  at  sunrise,  she  finds 
the  "sturdy  lad"  musing  over  Holborn's  "black  canal  of 
mud,"  and  bemoaning  his  lack  of  father  and  mother.  The 
goddess  mother  soothes  him  and  directs  him  in  the  em- 
ployment of  the  gifts  of  the  gods. 

^  Compare  William  Thompson's  The  Natiz'ity  (1736)  and  The 
Magi:  A  Sacred  Eclogue  for  similar  treatment. 


14  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

The  fine  attitude  of  Elizabethan  singers,  and  the  gentle 
mysticism  of  poets  like  Vaughan,  are  not  to  be  found  in 
those  poets  who  adhered  to  the  school  of  Dryden  and  Pope. 
During  the  first  half  of  the  eighteenth  century,  poetry  was 
largely  didactic,  satiric,  and  rational,  so  that  little  place  was 
found  for  children  and  the  parental  emotions  for  them. 
Parents  have  always  loved  and  observed  their  children,  and 
this  affectionate  regard  has  been  expressed  in  poetry  from 
the  time  of  Homer's  Astyanax.  Very  rarely,  however,  be- 
fore the  close  of  the  eighteenth  century  have  children  seized 
upon  the  poetic  imagination.  The  great  movements  in 
thought  and  emotion  which  stirred  the  century  tended  more 
and  more  to  direct  attention  to  the  child.  This  attention  was 
both  reflected  and  stimulated  by  the  poets  whose  verse  is  the 
subject  of  this  study. 


CHAPTER  I 

IN  OUR   INFANCY 

In  tracing  the  changes  which  took  place  in  the  poets' 
attitude  toward  infants  and  very  young  children,  it  is  not 
essential  to  take  into  account  a  very  large  number  of  lines 
imbedded  in  poems  on  subjects  not  connected  with  child- 
hood. Such  incidental  references  do  not  as  a  rule  indicate 
that  the  poet  is  writing  of  childhood  in  a  sympathetic  mood 
or  with  his  eye  on  the  individual  child.  Sometimes  there 
is  a  charming  glimpse  which  the  lover  of  children  is  not 
willing  to  forget,  as  in  John  Philipps's  Cyder,  where  chil- 
dren are  momentarily  noticed  while  they  are  gathering  cow- 
slips. Occasionally,  as  in  the  satirical  lines  of  Prior  and 
Lloyd,  side  glances  to  childhood  are  lively  and  enjoyable.^ 
Most  often,  however,  they  are  mechanical  and  serve  merely 
as  more  or  less  colorless  examples  to  illustrate  patly  a  point 
which  the   poet   wishes   to   emphasize.  -     For   a   right   un- 

1  Compare  Cowper's  charming  lines  On  Observing  some  Names 
of  little  Note  recorded  in  the  Biograpliia  Britannica: 

So  when  a  child,  as  playful  children  use, 
Has  burnt  to  tinder  a  stale  last  year's  news, 
The  flame  extinct,  he  views  the  roving  fire — 
There  goes  my  lady,  and  there  goes  the  squire ; 
There  goes  the  parson,  oh !  illustrious  spark, 
And   there,   scarce   less    illustrious,   goes   the   clerk. 

2  Langhorne  has  been  discussing  innate  ideas,  and  makes  his 
point  ("No  innate  knowledge  on  the  soul  impressed")    in  the  lines: 

See  the  pleased  infant  court  the  flaming  brand. 
Eager  to  grasp  the  glory  in  its  hand. 

(Enlargement  of  the  Mind) 
Samuel  Boyse's  Hope's  Farezvell  is  colorless : 

The  joys  you  gave  my  youth  to  taste 
Were  but  like  children's  toys  at  best. 


16 


ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 


derstanding  of  the  fundamental  change  which  took  place 
during  the  eighteenth  century  in  the  poets'  treatment  of 
very  young  children,  it  will  be  necessary  to  observe  poems 
in  which  the  child  is  specifically  the  subject. 

The  detached  poem  was  suggested  usually  by  the  child's 
birth,  birthday,  or  death;  but  some  of  the  most  successful 
poems  are  not  associated  with  special  occasions.  Before 
the  middle  of  the  century,  poets  as  a  rule  addressed  them- 
selves to  children  of  quality,  and  were  interested  in  child- 
hood rather  than  in  the  individual.  During  and  after  the 
sixties,  the  democratization  of  poetry  is  reflected  in  the  in- 
creasing number  of  poems  on  children  not  connected  with 
the  nobility  or  the  royal  household.  It  will  be  noted  that 
during  the  closing  decades  of  the  century  the  poet  is  occu- 
pied not  merely  with  childhood,  but  also  with  the  child. 
Although  it  is  inevitable  that  in  all  these  poems  the  child 
should  be  closely  associated  with  his  father  and  mother, 
special  attention  will  be  given  to  the  poet's  willingness  and 
ability  to  observe  the  child  as  an  individual  being. 

Among  the  writers  of  occasional  verse  in  the  early 
eighteenth  century,  Prior  alone  is  regularly  remembered  by 
compilers  of  anthologies  of  children's  verse.  His  charm- 
ing poems  reveal  a  delightful  urbanity  and  lightness  of 
touch  that  make  him  a  master  of  vers  de  societe.  He 
shows  perfect  command  of  the  adroitly  turned  compliment. 
If  the  study  of  childhood  in  poetry  were  extended  to  in- 
clude the  poetic  use  of  Cupid,  it  would  be  rewarding  to  con- 
sider Prior's  sensuous  realization  of  this  pagan  god,  who 
frequently  is  a  lively  actor  in  the  poems  addressed  to  Chloe. 
The  poet's  conception  of  the  young  god  is  so  vivid  that  he 
portrays  him  as  sobbing  before  his  mother  Venus  in  childish 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  17 

accents.  To  My  Lord  Buckhiirst  (very  young,  playing 
zmth  a  cat)  shows  Prior's  chamiing  treatment  of  the  god 
of  love,  and  is  as  dainty  in  conception  and  phrasing  as  his 
effusions  to  Chloe. 

The  posthumously  published  To  A  Child  of  Quality 
(five  years  old,  1/04,  the  author  then  forty)  is  too  well 
known  to  need  comment.  Study  of  the  poem  reveals  that 
only  three  stanzas  are  addressed  to  the  child  as  a  child. 
In  the  four  closing  stanzas  she  is  treated  as  a  girl  and 
young  woman.  Prior  in  his  most  sprightly  manner  con- 
trasts his  age  with  her  youth.  He  may  write  only  until 
she  can  spell ;  and  he  gives  point  to  his  feigned  regret  by 
observing  that  their  different  ages  are  ordained  to  move  so 
that  he  will  be  "past  making  love" 

When  she  begins  to  comprehend  it. 

It  is  a  frankly  artful  effusion.  The  child  of  quality  is  not 
so  much  the  subject  as  the  occasion  of  the  poem.  Prior 
expresses  his  middle-age  interest  in  the  child  of  quality,  not 
by  portraying  an  individual  child  but  by  assuming  an  air 
of  playful  gallantry.^ 

Although  more  didactic,  A  Letter  (to  the  Honourable 
Lady  Margaret  Cavendish  Harley,  when  a  child)  is  writ- 
ten with  a  closer  approach  to  the  child  spirit.  The  poem 
lacks  the  delicate  weaving  of  his  other  pieces,  but  in  its 
headlong  tumble  of  rhythm  reflects  the  merry  Prior  who, 
we  are  told,  delighted  to  be  the  carefree  companion  of  chil- 
dren. And  no  doubt  he  succeeded  in  convincing  children  of 
his  genuineness,  as  Peggy's  later  tribute,  after  she  had 
become  Duchess  of  Portland,  indicates :  ''he  made  himself 

1  Compare  Ernest  Bernbaum,  English  Poets  of  the  Eighteenth 
Century,  p.  xxi. 


18  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

beloved  by  every  living  thing  in  the  house — master,  child, 
servant,  human  creature  or  animal."  ^ 

The  Female  Phaeton  was  a  favorite  of  that  modern 
singer  of  child  lyrics,  Swinburne,  who  called  it  the  "most 
adorable  of  nursery  idylls  that  ever  was  or  will  be."  It  is  a 
rollicking  ballad  that  gives  no  certain  clue  as  to  the  age  of 
Kitty.  Vain  Kitty  is  inflamed  with  a  "little"  rage  at  being 
confined  with  Abigails  and  holy  books  while  Jenny  tastes 
the  sweets  of  society.  She  wishes  to  "quit  the  score"  with 
proud  Jenny  by  making  all  her  lovers  fall.  The  closing 
stanzas  show  all  Prior's  verve  and  lightheartedness  together 
with  the  finality  of  phrase  of  which  he  was  master : 

Fondness    prevailed,    mamma    gave    way; 
Kitty,   at   heart's   desire, 
Obtained  the  chariot  for  a  day, 
And  set  the  world  on  fire. 

The  charm  of  Prior's  child  poems  lies  in  the  make-believe  of 
the  adult  who  can  unbend  far  enough  to  enter  into  the  spirit 
of  children  and  who  brings  courtly  compliment,  classical 
reminiscence,  and  afifectionate  admiration,  all  in  homage  to 

1  Prior's  Alma  contains  lively  similitudes: 

For  as  young  children,  who  are  tied  in 

Go-carts,  to  keep  their  steps  from  sliding, 

When  members  knit,  and  legs  grow  stronger, 

Make  use  of  such  machine  no  longer, 

But  leap  pro  libitu,  and  scout 

On  horse  called  hobby,  or  without. 

Thus  each  should  down  with  all  he  thinks, 

As  boys  eat  bread  to  fill  up  chinks. 
Unlike  his  poems  inspired  by  children  of  quality,  these  lines  re- 
flect middle-class  child  life  as  he  might  have  observed  it  in  such 
a  home  as  that  of  the  common  soldier  and  his  wife  in  Long  Acre, 
noticed  by  Johnson  when  he  remarked  upon  Prior's  willingness  to 
descend  to  mean  company  after  an  evening  with  Bolingbroke,  Pope, 
and    Swift. 


IN    OUR    INFANCY  19 

the  child  of  quality.  Prior's  poems  represent  neo-classicist 
poetry  doing  its  very  prettiest  for  the  infant  and  young  child. 

Ambrose  Philips  phrased  fine  compliments  to  children 
of  his  patrons,  but  was  so  unfortunate  as  to  bring  down 
upon  himself  the  nickname  ''Namby  Pamby."  The  term, 
according  to  Mr.  Gosse,  was  first  used  by  Henry  Carey, 
author  of  Sally  in  Our  Alley,  in  a  parody  mentioned  by 
Swift  in  1725.^  Knowni  largely  through  the  contemptuous 
remarks  of  his  greater  contemporary,  Pope,  Philips  is  at  a 
disadvantage  with  his  modern  reader :  "Gay  is  writing  tales 
for  Prince  William :  I  suppose  Mr.  Philips  will  take  this 
very  ill  for  two  reasons ;  one  that  he  thinks  all  childish 
things  belong  to  him,  and  the  other  because  he'll  take  it  ill 
to  be  taught  that  one  may  write  things  to  a  child  without 
being  childish." 

Nevertheless,  the  poems  of  Philips  show  signs  of  a  new 
taste.  He  seeks  a  language  of  resemblance  that  will  reflect 
the  sweetness  and  grace  of  childhood,  as  is  clear  from  the 
lines  To  the  Honourable  Miss  Carteret: 

How  shall  I,  or  shall  the  Muse, 
Language  of  resemblance  choose? 
Language  like  thy  mien  and  face 
Full    of   sweetness,    full    of   grace. 

He  traces  the  child's  growth  from  year  to  year  by  beholding 
the  freshness  of  spring  after  spring,  with  each  time  a 
"brighter  bloom"  in  the  child.  Although  this  attitude  in- 
dicates a  tendency  to  break  away  from  classicist  standards, 
he  is  chiefly  concerned,  like  Prior,  with  the  conscious  belle 
who  will  exert  her  maiden  reign  over  "fond  beholders,"  fully 
half  the  poem  being  devoted  to  a  description  of  her  future 
courtship  and  nuptials. 

1  The  Dictionary  of  National  Biography  notes  that  the  third 
edition  of  Carey's  1713  publication  contains  the  "Namby  Pamby" 
poem.  s.  V.  Carey,  Henry. 


20  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

To  Miss  Margaret  Pulteney  (daughter  of  Daniel  Pul- 
teney,  Esq.)  in  the  Nursery,  April  2J,  172'j,  is  interesting. 
The  "Dimply  damsel,  sweetly  smiling"  rhythm  is  attractive 
but  not  sustained.  PhiHps  again  avoids  direct  observation 
in  the  thought  that  ten  years  hence  when  he  has  ceased 
composing,  "beardless  poets"  will  be  "fondly  rhyming,"  and 
accusing  "each  killing  feature"  of  the  cruel  maid.  There 
is  a  convincing  touch  in  the  lines  on  these  youthful  poets  who 
will  be 

Fescued  now,  perhaps,   in  spelling. 

A  Supplication  for  Miss  Carteret  in  the  Small-Por., 
Dublin,  July  31,  1725,  is  a  dignified  if  somewhat  self-con- 
scious prayer  for  a  child  suffering  from  the  dread  chil- 
dren's scourge  of  the  century.  The  disease  was  feared  in 
all  English  households.  The  early  education  of  John  Scott 
of  Amwell  was  desultory  because  his  father  had  such  an 
extreme  dread  of  the  small-pox  that  the  family  repeatedly 
moved  to  shun  it.  Shaftesbury  was  shocked  to  hear  that 
the  measles  had  been  followed  in  his  sister's  household  by 
the  small-pox  "which  I  pray  God  were  as  safe  over  with 
them."  Lady  Montagu's  letters  to  her  daughter,  and  her 
earlier  letters  from  Constantinople,  frequently  discuss  the 
small-pox;  and  her  efforts  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of 
children  by  means  of  inoculation  are  well  known.  The 
same  high  seriousness  and  dread  sincerity  which  char- 
acterize numerous  eighteenth -century  poems  on  the  re- 
covery of  adults  from  small-pox  permeate  the  lines  of 
Philips. 

To  Miss  Charlotte  Pulteney,  in  her  mother  s  arms.  May  i, 
1724,  is  the  prettiest  of  his  complimentary  verses.  Philips 
shows  felicity  of  phrase  in  suggestions  of  the  child's  heed- 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  21 

less  prattle.  His  charming  analysis  is  illuminated,  further- 
more, by  a  pleasing  image  from  bird  life.  There  is  freshness 
and  appropriateness  in  the  lines  which  associate  the  sportive 
green  linnet  and  the  wanton  infant.  In  the  early  period  it  is 
probably  the  first  detached  lyric  that  does  not  employ  a  na- 
ture image  mechanically  in  a  similitude.  It  represents  an 
early  efifort  to  express  something  of  the  spiritual  connotation 
of  the  linnet  and  the  infant  by  an  imaginative  perception  of 
the  underlying  unity  of  feeling.  For  once,  too,  the  child  is 
not  lost  in  the  marriageable  maiden.  In  an  attempt  to  be 
''simply  elegant  to  please,"  Philips  has  written  a  masterpiece. 

Timely  blossom,  infant  fair, 
Fondling  of  a  happy  pair. 
Every  morn,  and  every  night, 
Their  solicitous  delight, 
Sleeping,  walking,  still  at  ease, 
Pleasing,  without  skill  to  please, 
Little  gossip,  blithe  and  hale. 
Tattling  many  a  broken  tale, 
Singing  many  a  tuneless  song. 
Lavish  of  a  heedless  tongue, 
Simple  maiden,  void  of  art, 
Babbling    out    the    very    heart, 
Yet  abandoned  to  thy  will, 
Yet  imagining  no  ill, 
Yet  too  innocent  to  blush, 
Like  the  linnet  in  the  bush. 
To  the  mother-linnet's  note 
Moduling  her  slender  throat, 
Chirping  forth  thy  pretty  joys. 
Wanton   in   the   change   of  toys, 
Like  the  linnet  green,  in  May, 
Flitting  to  each  bloomy  spray, 
Wearied  then,  and  glad  of  rest, 
Like  the  linnet  in  the  nest. 


22  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

To  Miss  Georgiana,  youngest  daughter  to  Lord  Carteret, 
August  10,  172^,  indicates  an  attempt  to  write  from  direct 
observation. 

Is  the  silken  web  so  thin 
As  the  texture  of  her  skin? 
Can  the  lily  and  the  rose 
Such  unsullied  hue  disclose? 
Are  the  violets  so  blue 
As  her  veins  exposed  to  view? 

In  their  appropriateness  to  the  subject,  these  happy  parallels 
are  indicative  of  more  than  an  effort  to  phrase  literary  com- 
pliments. The  willingness  to  observe  such  details  counts 
for  much  during  the  first  quarter  of  the  century. 

The  poems  of  Ambrose  Philips  are  not  as  well  known  as 
Prior's,  but  two  of  them  are  historically  important  as  re- 
vealing early  evidence  of  a  new  taste.  Seventy-five  years 
before  Wordsworth  he  observed  the  green  linnet  and 
brought  it  into  connection  with  childhood. 

In  John  Gay's  lines  To  a  Lady  the  child  is  the  occasion 
of  the  poem.  Like  other  poets,  Gay  observes  the  "tender 
mother"  with  her  "infant  train,"  and  notes  every  "dawning 
grace."     The  children  are  perfect  images  of  their  mother.^ 

1  Set  phrases  and  imagery  preclude  vital  treatment.  These  are 
especially  noticeable  in  the  countless  panegyrical  and  epithalamic 
poems  directed  to  members  of  the  nobility  and  the  reigning  house. 
These  poems  echo  the  earlier  classicist  use  of  cupids,  charms,  and 
graces,  or  in  a  vein  of  strained  compliment  they  felicitate  bride  and 
groom  on  prospective  joys  of  the  nursery  (e.  g.,  Thomas  Newcomb's 
Ode  to  Lord  Carmarthen  on  his  Marriage  with  Lady  Anne  Seymour, 
1719).  Girls  are  invariably  the  image  of  their  mother,  and  boys 
always  reflect  the  manliness  and  power  of  their  father.  Such  lines 
are  without  doubt  echoes  of  lines  like  those  in  the  Nuptial  Ode  of 
Catullus,     (cp.  John  Gilbert  Cooper's  Song  to  JVinifreda.) 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  23 

The  early  virtues  of  the  son  promise  new-won  honors.^  Gay 
is  able  to  focus  his  attention  on  the  child  only  momentarily : 

When  he  the  tale  of  Audenard  repeats,' 

His  little  heart  with  emulation  beats; 

With  conquests  yet  to  come  his  bosom  glows,  I. 

He  dreams  of  triumphs  and  of  vanquished  foes. 

Each  year  with  arts  shall  store  his  ripening  brain, 

And  from  his  grandsire  he  shall  learn  to  reign. 

This  is  commonplace  enough  when  judged  by  romantic 
standards ;  but  in  view  of  classicist  unwillingness  to  analyze 
individual  traits  of  young  children,  Gay's  passing  notice  of 
the  budding  virtues  and  emotional  reactions  of  the  boy 
shows  an  incidental  interest  not  common  in  the  verse  of  his 
day.  As  in  his  lines  on  the  sentimental  apprentice  who  is 
poring  over  one  of  Otway's  plays  at  a  bookstall  (Trivia), 
Gay  reveals  a  willingness  to  find  specific  illustrations  in 
place  of  the  customary  generalizations. 

Lady  Winchilsea's  beautiful  poem  On  the  Death  of  the 
Honourable  Mr.  James  Thynne  (Younger  son  to  the  Right 
Honourable  the  Lord  Viscotint  Weymouth)  comes  from  the 
heart  of  the  poet,  and,  like  her  lines  that  reveal  fresh  ob- 
servation of  external  nature,  is  not  characteristic  of  the  age. 

1  Prose  and  poetry  indicate  that  the  preference  for  male  chil- 
dren was  strong.  Compare  the  letter  to  Lovelace  (Clarissa  Mar- 
lowe): "May  the  marriage  be  crowned  with  a  great  many  fine  boys 
(I  desire  no  girls)  to  build  up  again  a  family  so  ancient.  The 
first  boy  shall  take  my  surname  by  act  of  Parliament.  That  is  my 
will."    Langhorne's  Owen  of  Carron  has  the  lines, 

In  fortune  rich,  in  offspring  poor, 

An  only  daughter  crowned  his  bed. 
Shenstone's  Economy  and  Glover's  Leonidas  indicate  that  the  child- 
less marriage  was  looked  upon  as  unfortunate.  Wordsworth's  The 
Excursion  speaks  of  lonely  cottagers  as  the  "wedded  pair  in  child- 
less solitude."  The  dame  awaits  the  return  of  her  husband,  'True 
as  the  stock-dove  to  her  shallow  nest." 


24  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Far  from  being  representative,  the  poem  is  exceptional  in 
point  of  view  and  choice  of  material.  She  writes  with  the 
affection  of  a  close  friend.  After  she  has  addressed  herself 
to  soothing  the  parents'  grief,  the  boy's  entombment  is  sym- 
pathetically phrased  and  is  the  occasion  for  notice  of  his 
ancestors,  her  intimate  knowledge  of  the  family  adding  vivid 
individual  touches  which  make  the  passage  more  than  a 
catalogue  of  titled  names. 

She  tries  to  dissipate  the  gloom  by  rescuing,  if  she  may, 
the  memory  of  what  they  "lately  saw  so  fresh  and  fair." 
Among  the  ''beauties  of  his  blooming  age"  she  had  noted 

The   pleasing  light,   that  from   his   eyes   was   cast, 
Like  hasty  beams,  too  vigorous  to  last. 

She  recalls  harmless  sports  with  his  courser  on  the  lawn. 
He  was  sprightly  as  the  "enlivened  game,"  and  bold  in  the 
chase, 

Yet  in  the  palace   tractable   and   mild, 
Perfect  in  all  the  duties  of  a  child. 

For  its  time  this  poem  is  unique  in  the  marked  tendency 
to  close  observation  of  an  individual  child.  It  gives  inti- 
mate glimpses  of  the  child  against  the  home  background. 
In  many  of  her  lines  Lady  Winchilsea  is  an  early  forerunner 
of  those  poets  who  wrote  at  the  close  of  the  century. 

Children  are  noticed  only  vaguely  in  Aaron  Hill's  lines 
Writ  Upon  a  Pane  of  Glass  in  Westminster  House  under  the 
names  of  his  four  children  (1731).  He  notes  that  all  was 
happy  in  his  household  while  a  living  mother  exercised  her 
guardian  care. 

But,  joyless,  since  their  sweet  supporter  died, 
They  wander  now,  through  life,  with  half  a  guide. 

Francis  Fawkes's  On  the  Death  of  a  Young  Gentleman,  Sep- 
tember, I7S9,  is  preachy,  and  generalizes  with  little  attempt 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  25 

to  individualize  beyond  the  reference  to  the  child's  taking 
away 

Ere  the  first  tender  down  o'erspread  your  chin, 
A  stranger  yet  to  sorrow,  and  to  sin. 

The  poet's  sentiments  are  dignified  and  appropriate,  but 
there  is  no  inclination  to  analyze  the  child's  character  or  to 
notice  individualizing  traits.  ^ 

The  poet's  devotion  to  his  mother,  which  found  expression 
in  poetry  from  Thomson  to  Wordsworth,  did  not  at  first 
stimulate  recollections  of  childhood.  Pope,  who  through- 
out the  eighteenth  century  was  held  up  as  a  model  of  filial 
piety,  expressed  aflfection  for  his  mother  in  the  Epistle  to  Dr. 
Arbutluwt  (1735).  But  he  did  not  severely  modify  the  pre- 
cept of  his  school  that  there  must  be  no  display  of  purely 

1  The  eighteenth-century  tendency  to  moralizing  resulted  in  the 
employment  of  generalized  images  that  did  not  demand  close  ob- 
servation of  children.  Thomson's  method  of  generalized  descrip- 
tion is  reflected  in  his  treatment  at  the  close  of  Spring,  where  he 
contemplates  domestic  felicity  with  children  at  the  heart  of  the 
family.  He  phrases  the  child  element  in  terms  like  "smiling  off- 
spring"; he  observes  that  "infant  reason  grows  apace"  and  calls 
for  the  "kind  hand  of  an  assiduous  care."  There  is  more  vitality  in 
the  lines  which  portray  the  congenial  moral  element: 

Delightful   task !    to    rear   the    tender    thought, 
To  teach  the  young  idea  how  to  shoot, 
To  pour  the  fresh  instruction  o'er  the  mind, 
To   breathe    the   enlivening   spirit,    and    to    fix 
The  generous  purpose  in  the  glowing  breast. 

Hill's  deep  interest  in  his  children  is  felt  in  his  poem  To  Miranda 
(After  marriage,  with  Mr.  Locke's  Treatise  on  Education).  It  in- 
dicates that  he  put  into  his  wife's  hands  the  volume  which  would 
serve  as  "a  glass"  to  show  her  "what  these  infants  are"  in  order 
that  she  might  "by  this  just  light  direct  their  opening  way."  Yet 
he  followed  the  literary  method  then  in  vogue,  which  allowed  him 
to  rest  in  a  generalization. 


26  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

personal  emotion.  He  alludes  to  his  tender  duties  in  pro- 
longing the  life  of  his  aged  mother  'Vith  lenient  arts"  by 
rocking  the  ''cradle  of  reposing  age." 

Ten  years  earlier,  the  romantically  inclined  Thomson 
endeavored  to  break  through  this  restraint  in  his  poem  On 
the  Death  of  His  Mother  (1725).  He  wished  to  give  free 
expression  to  his  sorrow ;  face  to  face  with  sad  reality,  he 
set  out  to  thrust  aside  convention  in  order  to  write  from 
the  heart. 

Ye  fabled  Muses,  I  your  aid  disclaim, 
Your  airy  raptures,  and  your  fancied  flame : 
True   genuine    woe    my   throbbing   breast    inspires, 
Love  prompts  my  lays,  and  filial  duty  fires; 
The  soul  springs  instant  at  the  warm  design, 
And  the  heart  dictates  every  flowing  line. 

But  Thomson  can  not  wholly  depart  from  poetic  methods 
of  his  generation.  In  the  fluctuations  of  his  emotion  he 
recalls  how  his  widowed  mother,  her  orphans  about  her, 
often  "upbraided  her  needy  hands"  that  could  not  accomplish 
all  she  had  planned  for  her  children.  He  alludes  to  his 
brothers  and  sisters,  whom  she  left  behind  reluctantly.  As 
is  to  be  expected  in  a  poem  composed  during  the  first  quarter 
of  the  century,  his  strongest  emotion  is  revealed  in  recollec- 
tion not  of  early  childhood  but  of  his  departure  from  Leith 
for  London,  after  which  he  did  not  again  see  his  mother.  He 
reproaches  himself  for  having  left  her.  That  night  of  em- 
barkation is  now  a  torture  to  him:  "may  darkness  dye  it 
with  the  deepest  stains."  In  the  tumult  of  his  grief  he 
wishes  that  he  had  been  lost  at  sea,  and  that  fate  had  not  re- 
served him  for  the  unruly  woe  he  is  now  suffering.  But  he 
conquers  his  depression,  and  sees  his  mother  "with  immortal 
beauty  glow."  'She  no  longer  bears  the  "early  wrinkle" 
which  was  "care-contracted"  in  work  for  her  children  among 
the  "unnumbered  ills"  of  poverty, 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  27 

For  see !   attended  by  the  angelic  throng, 
Through  yonder  worlds  of  light  she  glides  along. 

Langhorne's  much  later  poem  Oil  His  Mother   (1759) 
shows  little  advance  over  Thomson's  treatment : 

Source  of  my  life,  that  led  my  tender  years, 

With  all  a  parent's  pious  fears. 
That  nursed  my  infant  thought,  and  taught  my  mind  to  grow. 

Although  his  recollection  of  childhood  is  more  extensive 
than  Thomson's,  it  is  not  more  detailed : 

Careful  she  marked  each  dangerous  way. 
Where  youth's  unwary  footsteps  stray : 

She  taught  the  struggling  passions  to  subside ; 
Where  sacred  truth,  and  reason  guide. 

In  virtue's  glorious  path  to  seek  the  realms  of  day. 

The  closer  observation  of  Ambrose  Philips,  Gay,  and 
Lady  Winchilsea  becomes  clear  by  comparison  with  Walter 
Harte's  To  the  Right  Honourable  Lady  Hertford,  upon  the 
birth  of  Lord  Beanchamp  (1721?).  In  this  minor  versifier 
the  fashion  of  avoiding  details  of  direct  observation  of  the 
infant  stands  out  baldly.  The  "gentle  infant"  is  adjured 
to  rise  from  his  slumbers,  to  lift  his  fair  head  and  "unfold" 
his  "radiant  eyes."  While  every  bosom  beats  with  height- 
ened pleasure, 

Surrounding  eyes  devour  the  beauteous  boy. 

As  if  this  were  sufficiently  close  approach  to  direct  contem- 
plation, Harte  is  oflf  with  the  statement  that  the  child  is 
destined  to  be  an  ornament  in  other  courts  where  he  will 
"wound  the  hearts  of  beauties  yet  unlx^rn."  '     After  this  the 

1  In  Russell's  sonnet  ("Dear  babe,  whose  meaning  by  fond  looks 
expressed"),  the  child  is  less  the  subject  than  the  poet  himself.  When 
he  is  thinking  of  the  child,  after  the  opening  lines,  he  is  concerned 
about  her  "riper  year." 


28  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

poet  returns  to  the  beau  in  embryo  and  invokes  the  "gentle 
Nine"  to  descend  and  deck  the  infant  with  laurels  and  bays/ 

William  Whitehead's  Charge  to  the  Poets  (1762)  advises 
poets  to  leave  traditional  rhyming  in  which  language  "Des- 
cends like  similes  from  Bard  to  Bard."  -  Poets  have  too 
long  copied  Greece  and  Rome.^  Although  Whitehead's 
birthday  odes  often  lean  heavily  on  Venus  and  the  Graces, 
his  delightful  poem  On  the  Birth-day  of  a  Young  Lady 
(Four  Years  Old)  reveals  an  attempt  to  hold  the  attention 
focused  on  the  child.  In  place  of  insipid  compliments 
there  is  a  simple  phrasing  of  the  joy  of  parents  over  the 
first  spoken  words  of  their  ofifspring.  The  poem  has  been 
overlooked  by  compilers  of  anthologies,  but  deserves  a 
place  in  collections  of  childhood  verse. 

1  Swift's  Directions  for  making  a  birth-day  song  (1729)  specifi- 
cally ridicules  classicalities : 

To  form   a   just  and   finished   piece, 
Take    twenty    gods    of    Rome    or    Greece, 
Whose  godship  are  in  chief  request, 
And  fit  your  present  subject  best; 
And  should  it  be  your  hero's  case, 
To  have  both  male  and  female  race, 
Your  business  must  be  to  provide 
A  score  of  goddesses  beside. 

-  In  A  Love  Song  (in  the  modern  taste),  Swift  takes  a  rhythmi- 
cal fling  at  the  vogue  of  Cupid : 

Fluttering   spread    thy    purple    pinions, 
Gentle  Cupid !  o'er  my  heart ; 
I  a  slave  in  thy  dominions, 
Nature  must  give  way  to  art. 

3  Thank  heaven  the  times  are  changed ;  no  poets  now 
Need  roar  for  Bacchus  or  to  Venus  bow. 


IN    OUR   INFANCY  29 

The  rosebud  opens  on  her  cheek, 
The  meaning  eyes  begin  to  speak ; 
And   in   each   smiling  look   is   seen 
The  innocence  which  plays  within. 
Nor   is   the    fault'ring  tongue   confined 
To  lisp  the  dawnings  of  the  mind, 
But  fair  and  full  her  words  convey 
The  little  all  they  have  to  say; 
And  each  fond  parent,  as  they  fall, 
Finds  volumes  in  that  little  all. 

Criticism  of  contemporary  poetry  may,  also,  be  indicative 
of  progress.  Poets  themselves,  after  the  middle  of  the 
century,  were  ready  for  a  change.  This  is  clear  from 
Lloyd's  The  Poetry  Professors,  in  which  Lloyd  is  following 
up  Swift's  early  protests.  ^  He  is  stirred  to  rebellion  by 
fulsome  complimentary  verse,  and  birthday  odes  are  an 
abomination.  -  Now  that  England  has  not  lost  her  prayers, 
and  *'A  royal  babe,  a  prince  of  Wales"  has  been  born  to 
George, 

Poets!  I  pity  all  your  nails — 

What  reams  of  paper  will  be  spoiled. 

What  graduses  be  daily  soiled 

By  inky  fingers,  greasy  thumbs, 

Hunting  the  word  that  never  comes. 

1  The  use  of  children  to  heighten  eflfect  aroused  the  ire  of  Swift. 
In  the  Satirical  Elegy  on  the  Death  of  a  Late  Famous  General  he 
exposes  this  treatment  as  so  much  sham : 

Behold  his  funeral  appears ; 
Nor  widow's  sighs  nor  orphan's  tears 
Wont  at  such  times  each  heart  to  pierce. 
Attend  the  progress  of  his  hearse. 
But  what  of  that?  his  friends  may  say 
He  had  those  honours  in  his  day, 
True  to  his  profit  and  his  pride. 
He  made  them  weep  before  he  died. 

2  Compare  The  Fanciad,  an  Heroic  Poem   (1743)  : 

No  hackneyed  Plunger,  Mine — no  Birth-Day  Drone. 


30  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

He  is  disgusted  with  the  classical  trumpery  of  verse  that 
will  force  pagan  gods  to  walk  again  in  triumph  at  the 
Christian  birth  of  the  prince/  Poets  of  trim  academic  taste 
will 

lug  them  in  by  head  and  shoulders, 
To  be  the  speakers,  or  beholders. 
Mars  shall  present  him  with  a  lance, 
To  humble  Spain  and  conquer  France ; 
The  Graces,  buxom,  blithe,  and  gay, 
Shall  at  his  cradle  dance  the  hay; 
And  Venus,  with  her  train  of  loves, 
Shall  bring  a  thousand  pair  of  doves 
To  bill,  to  coo,  to  whine,  to  squeak, 
Through  all  the  dialects  of  Greek.  ^ 

Signs  of  a  change  in  point  of  view  are  noticeable  also  in 
Miss  Whately's  verses.     She  exalts  simplicity  and  holds  it 

1  Compare  Gratulatio  solennis  Universitatis  Oxoniensis  ob 
celcissimum  Ger.  Fred.  Aug.  Williae  Principem,  Ger.  Ill  et  Char- 
lottae  Reg.  auspicatissime  natum.     Oxonii  1762. 

-  Lloyd  found  more  congenial  matter  in  the  homes  of  middle- 
class  Englishmen.  The  most  extended  lively  passage  that  throws 
light  on  eighteenth-century  nursery  methods  in  London  occurs  in 
Robert  Lloyd's  C hit-Chat.  The  situation  is  dramatically  conceived 
at  the  moment  when  Mrs.  Brown  and  her  companion  are  about  to 
leave  on  a  shopping  tour.  Jacky  insists  on  accompanying  his 
mother.  In  her  attempts  to  reconcile  Jacky  to  his  fate,  Mrs.  Brown 
runs  the  gamut  of  appeals  by  frightening  him  with  the  suggestion 
of  "bugaboes"  and  a  "naughty  horse"  that  will  bite  him,  and  the 
mob  that  will  tread  him  under  foot.  Jacky  has  by  this  time 
descended  from  crying  to  whining,  but  his  mother  persists  in  warn- 
ing him  that  he  might  "better  blubber,  than  be  lame."  She  coaxes 
him  to  her  with  "Come,  come,  then,  give  mamma  a  kiss,"  calls  Kitty 
to  take  Jacky  and  "fetch  him  down  the  last  new  toy,"  and  to  make 
him  as  merry  as  she  can. — Compare  also  Tom  Careful's  son  and 
daughter  in  Somerville's  The  True  Use  of  the  Looking-Glass. 


IN    OUR    INFANCY  31 

a  virtue  to  be  a  stranger  to  birthnight  balls/  In  Table 
Talk  Cowper  joins  the  democratic  chorus  and  pities  kings 
upon  whom  worship  waits 

Obsequious  from  the  cradle  to  the  throne. 
Before   whose    infant   eyes    the   flatterer   bows, 
And  binds  a  wreath  about  their  baby  brows.  - 

In  Hope,  his  further  strictures  on  man,  who  in  his  nurse's 
lap  seems  to  have  all  the  charms  of  a  cherub,  but  is  in 
reality 

the  genuine  offspring  of  revolt, 
Stubborn  and  sturdy,  a  wild  ass's  colt, 

smack  of  the  late-century  period  of  the  Revolution. 

In  his  lines  on  the  Death  of  an  Infant,  Lovibond  shows  a 
desire  to  substitute  for  well-worn  sentiments  and  theological 
commonplaces  a  naturalistic  conception  that  is  new  in  this 
type  of  poem.^  The  child  is  blessed  whom  Nature's  gentle 
hand  has  taken 

E'en  in  his  childish  days,  ere  yet  he  knew 
Or  sin,  or  pain,  or  youthful  passion's  force. 
In   Earth's  soft  lap,  beneath  the  flowery  turf. 
His  peaceful  ashes  sleep. 

Beattie's  Ode  on  Lord  Hay's  Birthday  reflects  senti- 
mental humanitarianism.     Beattie  protests  that  his  muse  is 

1  The  Lady's  Poetical  Magazine  or  Beauties  of  British  Poetry, 
Vol.  I,  1781. 

2  Compare  Charles  Churchill's  The  Ghost: 

Or    for    some    infant    doomed    by    fate 
To  wallow  in  a  large  estate, 
With  rhymes  the  cradle  must  adorn, 
To  tell  the  world  a  fool  is  born. 

^  Gray  is  conventional  in  Epitaph  on  a  Child. — Lovibond's  The 
Death  of  a  Young  Gentleman  shows  traces  of  naturalism.  See  also 
Cawthorn's  A  Father's  Extempore  Consolation  ("on  the  death  of 
two  daughters,  who  lived  only  two  days"). 


32  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

unskilled  in  venal  praise,  and  unstained  with  "flattery's  art." 
He  emphasizes  democratic  virtues.  As  it  matures,  the 
child  shall 

let  the  social  instinct  glow, 
And  learn  to  feel  another's  woe, 
And  in  his  joy  be  blessed. 

His  ancestral  towers  will  contain  no  dungeon  or  clanking 
chains,  but  instead 

The  open  doors  the  needy  bless, 

The    unfriended    hail    their    calm    recess. 

And  gladness  smile  around. 

As  ideals  for  the  child,  Beattie  substitutes  love  of  nature  and 
rural  simplicity.  As  admiring  multitudes  trace  the  patri- 
monial mien  in  the  growing  child,  they  will  note  ''the  liberal 
smile"  and  the  warm  heart.  Although  the  child  may  live 
to  win  a  nation's  love,  he  must  not  despise 

The  village  and  the  grove. 

For    innocence    with    angel    smile. 
Simplicity  that  knows  no  guile, 
And  love  and  peace  are  there. 

Beattie  becomes  so  wrapped  up  in  his  vision  of  simple  con- 
tentment that  he  forgets  the  child  in  the  exaltation  of  the 
unselfish  man,  who  alone  is  truly  great.  Though  not  dis- 
carded, the  set  imagery  of  traditional  birthday  verse  is 
subordinated  to  the  new  material. 

Francis  Hoyland's  Ode  (1763?)  likewise  reveals  the 
older  poetic  method  coming  into  contact  with  the  sentiment 
of  the  sixties.  His  lines  still  contain  personification  which 
stands  in  the  way  of  direct  observation  of  the  child ;  but  if 
"Zephyr"  and  "Poverty"  are  there,  we  find  side  by  side  with 
them  unmistakable  signs  of  personal  expression.  The  Ode, 
which   seems   to   have   been   addressed   to   his   child   under 


IN    OUR    INFANCY  33 

pathetic  circumstances  of  poverty,  had  the  distinction  of 
being  re-issued  from  the  Strawberry  Hill  press.  Little  is 
known  of  Hoyland's  life  beyond  the  fact  of  his  poverty. 
It  seems  that  he  had  enjoyed  some  favor,  but  that  depend- 
ence galled  him.  He  had  received  a  fatal  boon,  and  he 
wants  no  more  of  it.  He  prefers  the  honest  frown,  and  in 
the  words  of  his  biographer,  "like  the  country-mouse,  wishes 
to  be  restored  to  his  crust  of  bread  and  liberty." 

The  lines  of  welcome  to  his  child,  who  from  allusions  to 
blackbirds  was  born  probably  in  late  winter,  are  worthy 
of  high  rank  among  poems  about  children.  His  love  is 
simply  expressed.  Side  glances  to  birds  and  flowers  relieve 
emotional  tension  and  enrich  the  theme.  Although  the 
sentimental  note  is  not  absent,  Hoyland  shows  restraint, 
which,  however,  does  not  leave  his  reader  cold. 

And  art  thou  come,  ere  Zephyr  mild 

Has  waked  the  blackbird's  vernal  strain? 
Alas !  thou  com'st,  my  beauteous  child, 

Where  Poverty  her  iron  reign 
Extends,  more  bleak  and  cruel  far 
Than  winter  or  the  northern  star: 
Yet  cease  those  cries,  that  all  my  pity  move; 
Though  cold  the  hearth,  my  bosom  burns  with  love. 

Although  he  has  enriched  the  passage  by  an  image  from 
nature,  Lyttleton,  in  his  lines  in  the  Monody  in  memory  of 
Lady  Lyttleton  (1747),  echoes  Hill's  lines  on  his  motherless 
little  ones. 

Sweet  babes,  who,  like  the  little  playful  fawns. 
Were  wont  to  trip  along  these  verdant  lawns 

By  your  delighted  mother's  side. 

Who  now  your  infant  steps  shall  guide? 
Ah !  where  is  now  the  hand  whose  tender  care 
To  every  virtue  would  have  formed  your  youth, 
And  strewed  with  flowers   the  thorny   ways  of  truth  ? 


34  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

John  Scott,  who  in  one  year  had  lost  not  only  his  father, 
but  also  his  child  and  wife,  has  unaffectedly  memorialized 
his  grief  in  Amwcll,  in  Hertfordshire  (1768).  His  wife 
was  like  a  lovely  flower  "too  fair  for  this  rude  clime" ;  she 
bore  "one  beauteous  pledge,"  but  "The  fatal  gift  forbad  the 
giver's  stay" : 

In  one  sad  spot,  where  kindred  ashes  lie, 

O'er  wife,  and  child,  and  parents,  closed   the  ground. 

During  the  last  quarter  of  the  century  the  two  most 
widely  read  poems  of  this  class  were  Shaw's  Monody  to  the 
memory  of  Emma  (1768)  and  Address  to  a  Nightingale 
(1771).  The  secret  of  their  popularity  lies  in  a  sentimental 
abandon  to  frank  revelation  of  personal  grief  and  sorrow. 
Cuthbert  Shaw,  the  improvident  and  temperamental  son  of  a 
shoemaker,  was  at  one  time  and  another  a  tutor  in  litera- 
ture to  Chesterfield,  an  usher  in  a  school  at  Darlington, 
hack  writer  for  London  newspapers,  and  an  actor  first  in  a 
traveling  company  and  then  at  the  Haymarket.  He  mar- 
ried above  him  in  social  rank,  his  wife  renouncing  friends 
and  family  for  him.  The  seven  poems  addressed  to  her 
reveal  Shaw's  love  and  attachment.  After  the  death  of 
Emma  upon  the  birth  of  her  first  child,  he  wrote  the  Monody, 
which  poignantly  expresses  his  grief.  He  will  discard  "pa- 
geantry of  phrase" :  "111  suit  the  flowers  of  speech  with  woes 
like  mine."  He  asks  friends  to  forbear  telling  him  of  her 
matchless  virtues,  which  he  knows  too  well.  He  hopes  that 
the  gush  of  tears  from  his  welling  heart  may  discharge  his 
load  of  grief.  Shaw  wrote  in  the  moments  when  he  felt 
his  loss  most  keenly.  He  sings  her  virtues  in  tearful  lines 
that,  of  course,  made  a  surer  appeal  during  the  sentimental 
sixties  and  after,  than  now  when  the  reader  prefers  the 
poet's  overflow  of  emotion  recollected  in  tranquillity.  A 
generation,  however,  that  wept  over  Clarissa  and  Julia  was 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  35 

certain  to  be  profoundly  stirred  by  the  dying  Emma's  appeal 
for  the  welfare  of  her  child  in  the  vision  of  a  possible  second 
wife's  cruelty.  Her  homely  api>eal,  "My  dearest  Shaw, 
forgive  a  woman's  fears,"  is  made  dramatically  effective  by 
broken  lines  and  pauses  which  reflect  her  tense  emotion 
when  she  implores  him  to  take  her  infant  daughter  to  some 
remote  spot  where  she  may  enjoy  his  parental  love  undis- 
turbed. 

The  closing  stanzas  addressed  to  the  infant  left  to  share 
his  woes,  reflect  the  trembling  sensibility  characteristic  of 
the  poem.  Shaw  looks  into  the  future.  When  the  child  is 
twining  round  his  knees,  his  eyes  will  often  fill  with  tears  as 
he  traces  the  mother's  smiles  and  thinks  of  how  the  child 
was  "Bought  with  a  life  yet  dearer  than  thy  own."  Then 
he  touches  upon  the  motherless  child  motive : 

Who  now   shall   seek  with   fond   delight 
Thy  infant  steps  to  guide  aright? 

The  sentimental  father  is  not  satisfied  to  close  his  grief  here, 
but  must  press  on  to  the  days  when  he  will  be  ill  and  helpless. 

Say,  wilt  thou  drop  the  tender  tear, 
Whilst  on  the  mournful  theme  I  dwell? 
Then,  fondly  stealing  to  thy  father's  side, 

Whene'er  thou  seest  the  soft  distress, 
Which  I  would  vainly  seek  to  hide, 

Say,  wilt  thou  strive  to  make  it  less? 
To  soothe  my  sorrows,  all  thy  cares  employ, 
And  in  my  cup  of  grief  infuse  one  drop  of  joy? 

This  is,  indeed,  the  very  luxury  of  grief.  The  playgoers 
who  had  been  surprised  into  sentimental  tears  in  1696  had 
long  passed  away.  But  another  generation  that  wept  over 
sentimental  plays  and  novels  welcomed  such  a  poem  as 
Shaw's  because  the  poet  was  writing  in  the  mood  which 
was  p>opular  in  drama  and  fiction. 


36  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Shaw  again  levies  the  ''tribute  of  a  tear"  in  the  ''sorrow- 
soothing  strains"  of  the  Address  to  a  Nightingale,  which 
three  years  later  memorializes  the  death  of  Emma's  child. 
The  muse  shall  complain  in  piteous  accents  "And  dwell  with 
fond  delay  on  blessings  past."  Imagery  drawn  from  bird 
life  accentuates  the  fast-growing  popularity  of  new  subject- 
matter  which  was  finally  to  crowd  out  altogether  the  tra- 
ditional set  imagery.  Shaw  feels  that  the  piteous  notes 
which  sadden  all  the  groves  must  be  prompted  by  a  loss 
akin  to  his.  Does  the  bird  mourn  a  lost  mate,  or  is  she 
bereft  of  her  darling  young?  The  poet  weeps  for  both.  He 
has  lost  a  bride  in  her  youthful  charms,  but  also  "A  lovely 
babe  that  should  have  lived  to  bless"  his  declining  years. 
The  child  languished  for  a  mother's  aid,  and  winged  its 
flight  to  seek  her  parent  in  the  skies.  No  one  is  left  to 
"soothe  the  anguish  of  an  aching  heart."  Strangers  who 
are  far  removed  from  his  affections  must  fulfill  the  last  sad 
office.  Yet  as  long  as  he  has  life  he  will  dwell  fondly  on 
"blessings  past." 

Although  his  sentimentalism  is  literary,  Shaw  can  not  be 
accused  of  the  insincerity  of  Sterne.  Shaw  differs  from 
Sterne  in  that  his  poems  are  motivated  by  personal  grief. 
No  matter  how  the  modern  reader  may  react  to  his  literary 
method,  two  historical  facts  stand  out;  that  his  grief  em- 
phasized the  personal  point  of  view  toward  childhood,  and 
that  the  deep  impression  he  made  upon  his  and  the  following 
generation  prepared  the  way  for  a  more  sympathetic  ap- 
proach to  childhood  by  accentuating  emotional  treatment. 

During  this  period  the  boundaries  of  poetry  were  in  fact 
extended  to  include  a  minuter  and  more  specific  interest  in 
infants  and  nursery  affairs.  Poetry  had  lagged  behind  prose 
in  notice  of  the  mother's  duties  toward  her  child  in  such 
matters  as  nursing,  diet,  clothes,  regulation  of  sleep.     In 


IX   OUR    IXFAXCY  37 

view  of  contemporary  interest  in  the  interminable  poems  on 
apple  growing,  raising  the  sugar  cane,  tilling  the  fields,  and 
caring  for  sheep,  one  feels  justified  in  the  expectation  of 
coming  upon  a  poem  dealing  with  the  nurture  of  infants. 
Armstrong  had  in  fact  written  a  poem  on  health,  in  which, 
hovv^ever,  he  had  taken  no  notice  of  the  needs  of  children. 
The  general  neglect  is  all  the  more  surprising  in  view  of 
the  broad  foundation  Locke  had  laid  in  Thoughts,  in  which 
he  discussed  the  minutest  details  of  exercise,  care  and 
covering  of  the  feet,  clothes,  diet,  bedding,  and  sleep.  Locke 
was  widely  read  throughout  the  century,  and  Richardson 
must  have  had  his  Locke  open  before  him  while  writing 
Pamela  (1740).  Richardson  has  Pamela  discuss  the  duties 
of  a  mother  to  nurse  her  child.  Publishers'  announce- 
ments from  1728  to  1 79 1  indicate  that  books  on  child  nur- 
ture were  in  demand.^ 

Before  Jerningham's  //  Lattc  (1767),  which  treats  at 
length  of  the  mother's  obligation  to  nurse  her  child,  poets 
had  not  awakened  to  the  needs  of  infants.  ^  Jerningham  is 
forward-looking  in  sentiment,  although  he  employs  the  set 
imagery  of  earlier  poetry.  fAmid  allusions  to  Lucina's 
friendly  aid,  and  fluttering  Loves  and  Cupids,  he  couches 
an  appeal  for  a  consideration  of  the  natural  rights  of  the 
infant   who   "with   artless  eloquence"   asks   "The   boon   of 

1  The  ever-widening  interest  in  children  finally  prompted  Hugh 
Downman,  M.  D.,  to  write  a  poem  called  Infancy,  which  was  pub- 
lished in  two  parts  in  1774  and  1775.  It  is  uninspired,  and  gives 
practical  directions  for  the  care  of  young  children,  in  diction  that 
is  anything  but  poetic.  Although  the  very  favorable  notices  in  the 
Monthly  Review  hail  the  author  as  a  benefactor  of  childhood,  the 
editor  observes  that  ''there  are  no  vulgar  mothers  or  vulgar  nurses 
who  can  decipher  the  recipe  for  making  what,  we  think,  they  call 
pap."     Specimens  are  quoted  in  Monthly  Rcvicn',  Vol.  LITI.  p.  200. 

2  Compare,  however,  J.  Warton's  Fashion. 


38  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Nature,  but  asserts  in  vain."  The  mother's  task  is  resigned 
to  strangers  ''while  Nature  starts,  and  Hymen  sheds  a 
tear."  While  the  mother  seeks  fantastic  pleasure,  the  nurs- 
ling lifts  his  voice,  ''his  tears  unnoticed,  and  unsoothed  his 
pain."  Like  Beattie,  Jerningham  advocates  the  return  to 
nature  in  the  interest  of  the  welfare  of  infants.  Of  what 
avail  are  "the  splendid  nursery,  and  the  attendant  train?" 
It  would  have  been  better  had  the  infant  first  seen  light  in 
an  obscure  cottage,  where  he  would  have  reposed  securely 
in  the  "cradling  arm"  of  a  cottage  mother. 

Say  why,  illustrious  daughters  of  the  great, 
Lives  not  the  nursling  at  your  tender  breast? 

Although  the  problems  surrounding  childbirth  were  dis- 
cussed in  magazines,  earlier  poets  of  the  century  seem  to 
have  been  content  with  references  to  Lucina's  squalling  hour 
or  with  colorless  details  in  remote  connections  such  as  the 
birth  of  Apollo  or  Time.^  There  seems  to  have  been  slight 
inclination  even  throughout  the  middle  decades  of  the  cen- 
tury to  approach  the  subject  more  closely  than  Langhorne, 
who  calls  upon  man  to  contemplate  his  birth  and  "mortify 
his  pride" ;  or  he  writes  of  man  as  "helpless  born,"  one 
whom  the  "brute  sagacious"  might  scornfully  behold.  ^  In 
the  eighties,  however,  Mr.  Ekins  unaffectedly  approaches 

1  Planetary  influence,  although  it  persists  as  a  curious  survival 
of  traditional  lore,  is  not  vitally  associated  with  childhood.  Sir 
Walter  Scott's  radical  change  of  plan  in  Guy  Mannering;  or  The 
Astrologer  indicates  his  belief  that  astrology  was  no  longer  familiar 
to  readers.  Yet  Wordsworth  wrote  of  fanes  in  which  the  moon 
was  once  worshipped  by  matrons  who 

yielding  to  rude  faith 
In  mysteries  of  birth  and  life  and  death 
And  painful  struggle   and   deliverance — prayed 
Of  thee  to  visit  them  with  lenient  aid. 

2  Compare  also  Mason's  The  Dean  and  the  Squire. 


IX   OUR    INFANCY  39 

the  subject  in  a  poem  On  the  Birth  of  a  First  Child  (1783). 
Preoccupied  as  he  is  chiefly  with  the  novel  joys  and  duties 
of  parenthood,  he  does  not  fail  to  notice  details  in  the  cir- 
cumstances of  motherhood  that  must  precede  a  joy  like  his.^ 
Thomson  had  long-  before  the  sixties  brought  poverty 
and  sentiment  together,  and  indeed  had  focused  them  on 
childhood.  Men  like  Hoyland  and  Shaw  had  tapped  the 
reservoir  of  personal  emotion  in  the  development  of  themes 
from  childhood.  It  remained  for  Burns  to  open  the  flood- 
gates, twenty  years  after  Hoyland's  Ode,  in  A  Poet's  Wel- 
come to  his  Love-he  gotten  Daughter  (1784),  with  the  sub- 
title "The  first  instance  that  entitled  him  to  the  venerable 
appellation  of  father."  Hoyland  and  Shaw  had  already 
broken  with  classicist  restraint  that  frowned  upon  the  dis- 
play of  personal  emotion  as  evidence  of  singularity,  but 
Burns  is  a  son  of  the  Revolution  in  the  rebellious  bravado 
with  which  he  faces  an  unfriendly  world.  Although  he 
feels  the  irregularity  of  the  child's  birth,  he  is  not  disturbed 
by  it.  He  will  be  a  loving  father  "and  brag  the  name  o't." 
He  will  love  her  as  the  "Wee  image  o'  my  bonnie  Betty."  He 
gives  her  a  fatherly  kiss  and  sets  her  near  his  heart.  Though 
she  came  unsought  for,  and  the  gossips  will  "tease"  his 
name  "in  kintry  clatter,"  she  shall  be  "bienly  clad"  and  well 
educated.  He  will  not  blush  when  she  calls  him  "Tyta  or 
daddie."  His  wishes  are  that  she  may  inherit  her  "mither's 
person,  grace,  and  merit"  and  her  own  worthless  daddy's 
spirit,  "without  his  failins."  Johnson  had  given  good 
classicist  counsel  in  his  dictum  that  "very  few  can  boast  of 
hearts  which  they  dare  lay  open  to  themselves,  and  of 
which,  by  whatever  accident  exposed,  they  do  not  shun  a 

^  Compare  Epitaph  on  Lady  Lucy  Mcyrick  who  died  in  child- 
birth, by  Dr.  Peter  Templeman. — In  A  Classical  Arrangement  of  Fu- 
gitive Poetry,  vol.  XV  (1797),  On  the  Birth  of  a  First  Child  is  at- 
tributed to  the  Rev.  Dr.  Jeffry  ("Late  Dean  of  Carlisle")  . 


40  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

distinct  and  continued  view ;  and,  certainly,  what  we  hide 
from  ourselves  we  do  not  show  to  our  friends."  Burns, 
however,  shows  the  triumph  of  a  different  philosophy,  and 
the  complete  emergence  of  romantic  individuality. 

Before  Burns  the  theme  of  the  expectant  mother  is  no- 
ticed in  vague  platitudes.  ^  Burns's  treatment  of  the  theme 
in  two  ballads  that  are  associated  with  Jean  Armour  is  symp- 
tomatic of  the  frank  realism  of  the  naturalistic  school.  In 
the  home  of  the  miller  of  Tarbolton,  where  Burns  had  found 
shelter  for  her  after  she  had  been  disowned  by  friends  and 
family,  she  recounts  her  loneliness,  but  is  cheered  by  his 
gifts.-  Winter  will  soon  pass  away,  and  Spring  will  bright- 
en the  birch  wood.  Then  her  "young  baby  will  be  born,"  and 
*'he'll  be  hame  that's  far  awa."  The  Rantin  Dog,  the  Dad- 
die  O't  (1786)  is  a  study  of  the  lonely  mother's  fluctuations 
of  emotion  as  she  thinks  ahead  to  her  humiliating  situation 
in  the  penance  stool.  Other  fears  press  upon  her.  Will 
he  help  her  name  the  child;  will  he  show  affection  in  her 
hour  of  trial;  but  above  all,  "wha  my  babie-clouts  will 
buy  ?" ^ 

In  Burns  the  free  play  of  personality  almost  wholly 
crowds  out  set  imagery,  which  gives  place  to  spontaneous 
treatment  of  childhood  in  his  delightful  complimentary 
poems  A  Rose-Bud  By  My  Early  Walk  and  To  Miss  Cruick- 
shank,  as  well  as  in  the  humanitarian  On  the  Birth  of  a 
Posthumous  Child.     These  poems   are   far  removed   from 

1  Compare  Beattie's  The  Minstrelj  I,  stanza  15  (at  Edwin's 
birth), 

The  gossip's  prayer  for  wealth,  and  wit,  and  worth. 

-  The  Bonie  Lad  That's  Far  Awa. 

3  For  a  discussion  of  the  unmarried  mother,  see  The  Unmarried 
Mother  in  German  Literature,  by  Oscar  H.  Werner  (Columbia  Uni- 
versity Press). 


IX   OUR    INFANCY  41 

the  art  of  Prior  in  that  they  are  written  in  the  mood  of  a  poet 
who  knows  nature  intimately  in  country  lanes  and  by-ways. 
Burns  has  substituted  flowers  and  animals  for  classical 
mythology  and  conventions  of  polite  London  society.  The 
child  is  made  attractive  through  association  with  fresh  im- 
agery drawn  from  nature. 

While  suffering  from  a  cold  that  confined  him  for  some 
days  to  the  house  of  Mr.  William  Cruickshank,  a  teacher  in 
the  high  school  ait  Edinburgh,  Burns  composed  songs  which 
Janet  Cruickshank,  his  "sweet  little  Rose-bud,"  helped  him 
set  to  music  on  her  harpsichord.  Two  complimentary 
poems  are  the  result  of  his  sojourn  in  the  Cruickshank 
household.  In  A  Rose-Bud  By  My  Early  Walk  (1787)  the 
poet  is  definitely  out  of  doors.  He  feels  the  freshness  and 
glow  of  life  in  the  fields  as  he  breathes  in  the  rich  perfume 
of  the  rose,  and  observes 

Within  the  bush  her  covered  nest, 
A  little  linnet  fondly  pressed, 

who  will  soon  hear  her  brood  among  the  "green  leaves 
bedewed"  waken  the  early  morning  with  their  song. 

So  thou,  dear  bird,  young  Jeany  fair, 
On  trembling  string  or  vocal  air, 
Shall  sweetly  pay  the  tender  care 

That  tents  thy  early  morning. 

So  thou,  sweet  Rose-bud,  young  and  gay, 
Shalt  beauteous  blaze  upon  the  day, 
And  bless  the  parent's  evening  ray 

That   watched   thy   early   morning. 

Like  Prior,  Burns  is  writing  in  a  complimentary  vein,  but 
for  the  graces  of  a  highly  organized  society  Bums  has  em- 
ployed natural  beauty,  and  has  addressed  the  child  in  terms 
of  birds  and  flowers. 


42  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

The  identification  of  maiden  and  flower  is  complete  in 
To  Miss  Cniickshank  (1787).  In  spite  of  the  phrases 
''Boreas'  hoary  path"  and  ''Eurus'  poisonous  breath,"  which 
show  a  backward  look  to  classicist  material,  the  spontaneous 
nature  imagery,  which  recognizes  no  cleavage  between 
flower  and  child,  places  this  effusion  by  the  side  of  its  com- 
panion poem  as  a  charming  manifestation  of  the  new  atti- 
tude in  occasional  verse  on  children. 

On  the  Birth  of  a  Posthumous  Child  (1790)  retains  the 
structural  elements  of  early  eighteenth-century  occasional 
verse,  but  at  the  same  time  weaves  in  beautiful  nature 
imagery  with  a  dignity  and  appropriateness  worthy  of  the 
poet's  prayer  for  the  welfare  of  the  helpless  orphan.  Burns 
speaks  with  simple  sincerity. 

May  he  who  gives  the  rain  to  pour, 

And  wings  the  blast  to  blaw, 
Protect   thee    frae   the    driving   show'r, 

The  bitter  frost  and  snaw. 

* 

Blest  be  thy  bloom,  thou  lovely  gem, 

Unscathed  by  ruffian  hand. 
And  from  thee  many  a  parent  stem 

Arise  to  deck  our  land. 

The  charm  of  these  poems,  then,  lies  not  in  the  increased 
willingness  or  power  to  observe  the  child  as  an  individual, 
but  in  the  substitution  of  nature  imagery  and  humanitarian 
sentiment  for  classicist  material. 

There  is  also  a  vast  difference  of  method  between  the 
early  poetic  use  of  set  imagery  and  the  free  naturalistic  ob- 
servation of  Blake.  Watts's  A  Cradle  Hymn  (1719)  char- 
acteristically treats  the  child  as  a  kind  of  lay  figure  or 
bit  of  stage  property.  In  Watts's  lullaby,  the  mother's  ab- 
sorption in  her  narrative  causes  her  to  sing  so  vehemently 
that  she  awakens  her  child.     She  shows  no  inclination  to 


'4 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  43 

observe  the  child  itself.  Blake's  A  Cradle  Soiii^,  on  the 
other  hand,  depicts  a  mother  who  is  sensitive  to  impressions 
of  her  sleeping  infant.  The  reader  is  made  to  feel  that  she 
is  watching  over  a  living,  breathing  creature,  and  she  draws 
spiritual  suggestions  from  her  baby's  body.  She  lovingly 
traces  soft  desires  and  pretty  infant  wiles  in  her  baby's  face. 

As  thy  softest  limbs  I  feel, 
Smiles  as  of  the  morning  steal 
O'er    thy    cheek    and    o'er    thy    breast 
Where  thy  little  heart  does  rest.  ^ 

On  the  Receipt  of  my  Mother's  Picture  out  of  Norfolk 
has  been  called  the  "most  resplendent  gem  in  Cowper's 
casket."  The  poem  embodies  that  finality  in  sentiment  and 
form  which  is  essential  to  the  creation  of  a  classic.  Cow- 
per's poem,  like  those  of  preceding  poets  on  the  mother 
motive,  is  the  expression  of  loving  duty  toward  a  parent 
whose  memory  he  cherishes.  'Like  them  he  contemplates 
her  happy  state  in  Heaven ;  but  he  enjoys  the  advantage  of 
not  being  overwhelmed  by  an  immediate  sense  of  grief.  Not 
the  death  of  his  mother,  but  her  picture  inspires  him,  so 
that  he  need  not  attempt  to  express  an  overflow  of  emotion, 
but  may  write  with  serenity.  In  the  warm  glow  of  recol- 
lection he  awakens  tender  memories  of  his  earliest  childhood 
days.  Through  contemplation  of  his  mother's  picture,  he 
has  lived  his  childhood  over  again  and  has  ''renewed  the 
joys  that  once  were  mine."  jHis  recollections  of  childhood 
companionship  with  his  mother  are  suffused  with  tender  re- 
gret. 

Unlike  Thomson  and  Langhorne,  Cowper  analyzes  his 
childish  thoughts  and  emotions.  His  imagery  of  childhood, 
conceived  with  the  concreteness  of  Wordsworth,  and   ex- 

1  In  Poems  from  the  Rossetti  Manuscript. 


44  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

pressed  with  equal  simplicity,  carries  the  reader  back  to 
the  poet's  earliest  years  at  the  knees  of  his  mother,  or  to 

Where  the  gardener  Robin,  day  by  day, 
Drew  me  to  school  along  the  public  way, 
Delighted  with  my  bauble  coach,  and  wrapped 
In  scarlet  mantle  warm,  and  velvet  capped. 

Or  he  gives  intimate  glimpses  of  life  in  the  household : 

Thy  nightly  visits  to  my  chamber  made, 

That  thou  mightest  know   me   safe  and   warmly   laid ; 

Thy  morning  bounties  ere  I  left  my  home, 

The  biscuits,  or  confectionary  plum ; 

The  fragrant  waters  on  my  cheeks  bestowed 

By  thy  own  hand,  till   fresh  they  shone   and   glowed. 

No  details  are  too  lowly  to  be  recalled  with  affection.  The 
sentiment  is  throughout  reduced  to  its  true  simplicity ;  there 
is  no  tendency  toward  rhetoric.  The  poem  is  written  with 
a  colloquial  ease  that  never,  even  in  an  informal  phrase  like 
''mimic  show  of  thee,"  disturbs  the  fine  sincerity  of  the 
lines.  The  intimate  details  indicate  how  far  poetry  had 
developed,  since  the  days  of  Prior  and  Pope,  in  the  direction 
of  easy  personal  revelation. 

Wordsworth  has  several  times  by  extended  interpreta- 
tion of  details  noticed  the  infant  in  the  hour  of  its  birth. ^ 
For  the  master  poet  of  our  study  no  phase  of  childhood  is 
unworthy  of  exalted  poetic  interpretation.  He  looks  upon 
natural  joy  over  the  birth  of  a  child  as  a  fit  subject  for 
poetic  treatment,  his  imagery  being  in  harmony  with  his 

temperamental  high  seriousness.     In  To (upon  the 

birth  of  her  first-horn  child,  March,  i8j^),  Wordsworth's 
treatment  follows  much  the  same  general  outline  as  the 
poem  of  Ekins,  but  he  has  enriched  it  with  imagery  and 
suggestions    of   spiritual    insight.     A    beautiful    calm    per- 

1  See  Michael  and  The  Thorn. 


IN    OUR    INFANCY  45 

vades  the  lines,  which  join  with  the  facts  of  direct  observa- 
tion a  high  philosophy  of  spiritual  contentment  and  thanks- 
giving. 

He  considers  the  plight  of  the  helpless  babe  who, 
"Flung  by  labouring  nature  forth,"  lies  in  "tenderest  naked- 
ness." From  the  "penalty"  of  the  mother's  throes  that  are 
now  ended,  there  springs  "more  than  mortal  recompense" 
in  the  "blissful  calm" 

Known    but    to    this    one    release. 

The  mother's  silent  thanks,  that  rise  "incense-like"  to 
Heaven,  mingle  also 

With  the  gush  of  earthly  love, 
As  a  debt  to  that  frail  Creature, 
Instrument  of  struggling  Nature. 

The  troubles  and  pains  of  life  which  the  child  will  experience 
are 

Presignified  by  that  dread  strife 

Whence  ye  have  escaped  together. 

But  if  the  child  follows  the  steps  of  her  mother 

She  may  look  for  serene  weather; 
In  all  her  trials  sure  to  find 
Comfort  for  a  faithful  mind ; 
Kindlier  issues,  holier  rest, 
Than  even  now  await  her  prest. 
Conscious  Nursling,  to  thy  breast. 

In  addition  to  his  deep  spiritual  insight,  Wordsworth 
often  displays  a  matter-of-fact,  almost  scientific,  faithfulness 
of  observation.  Luke  slept  for  two  days  after  his  birth, 
"as  oft  befalls  to  new  born  infants."  But  as  the  poet  con- 
templates his  favorite  daughter  Dora  at  the  age  of  one 
month,  while  she  sleeps  in  "heedless  peace,"  he  is  not  dis- 
turbed by  scientific  doubts  as  to  automatic  muscular  contrac- 
tions.    He  notes  that 


46  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Smiles    are    beginning,    like    the    beams    of    dawn 
To  shoot  and  circulate,  .  .  . 
';  Tranquil  assurance  that  Heaven  supports 

The  feeble  motions  of  thy  life,  and  cheers 
Thy    loneliness:    or    shall    those    smiles    be    called 
Feelers  of  love,  put  forth  as  if  to  explore 
This  untried  vv^orld? 

In  the  true  mood  of  naturalism  his  thoughts  turn  to  her 
probable  state  had  she  been 

of  Indian  birth 
Couched  on  a  casual  bed  of  moss  and  leaves, 
And  rudely  canopied  by  leafy  boughs, 
Or  to  the  churlish  elements  exposed 
On  the  bleak  plains. 

The  closing  stanzas  of  Dorothy's  The  Mother  s  Return 
(1807)  reveal  a  sympathetic  insight  into  the  sudden  changes 
and  fleeting  moods  of  early  childhood.  After  hours  of 
vigorous  play  there  is  a  ''momentary  heaviness"  of  heart 
v^hen  the  evening  star  calls  to  rest,  but  they  run  upstairs 
in  ''merry  fit"  and  "gamesome  race." 

Five    minutes    past — and,    O    the    change ! 
Asleep  upon  their  beds  they  lie; 
Their  busy  limbs  in  perfect  rest, 
And  closed  the  sparkling  eye. 

Dorothy's  Holiday  at  Gwerndzififnant,  May,  1826,  likewise 
shows  her  faithful  observation  of  the  almost  instantaneous 
alertness  of  children  upon  awaking  in  the  morning.  After 
evening  prayer 

Theirs  is  one  long,  one  steady  sleep, 

Till  the   sun,  tip-toe   on  the   steep 

In  front  of  our  beloved  cot, 

Casts   on   the   walls   her   brightest   beams. 

Within,  a  startling  lustre  streams. 
',   They  all  awaken  suddenly; 
;  As  at  the  touch  of  magic  skill.  .  .  . 


IN    OUR    INFANCY  47 

In  The  Excursion  (  \')  Wordsworth  is  subtle  in  his  obser- 
vation of  the  infant  who,  as  he  slowly  awakens,  stretches  his 
limbs, 

bemocking  as  might  seem. 
The  outward  functions  of  intelligent  man. 

Wordsworth's  To  H.  C.  (Six  Years  Old)  (1802)  illus-j 
trates  the  change  of  poetic  treatment  that  came  with  a  fuller 
acceptance  of  the  theory  of  natural  rights  and  rights  of  the 
individual.  Prior  and  Ambrose  Philips  looked  upon  chil- 
dren in  the  light  of  the  doctrine  of  conformity.  They 
thought  o'f  the  child  in  terms  of  the  belle,  and  Thomas 
Warton  conceived  the  young  prince  in  terms  of  the  states- 
man.^ In  doing  this  they  observed  the  fruition  of  the  nor- 
mal development  the  child  was  expected  to  follow.  The 
civilization  under  whose  protection  they  lived,  depended  for 
its  existence  on  conformity  by  mutual  consent.  The  career 
of  the  children  who  were  subjects  of  their  verse  was  pre- 
determined by  circumstances  that  had  become  fixed,  and  it 
was  the  natural  expectation  that  children  would  fit  into  the 
groove  into  which  they  had  been  born.^ 

The  romanticists,  however,  in  so  far  as  they  were  sons 
of  the  Revolution,  and  had  felt  the  forces  working  for 
democracy,  did  not  recognize  the  binding  power  of  human 
institutions.  They  brushed  aside  the  ideal  of  conformity 
and  gave  free  play  to  individuality.     It  follows  that  Words- 

1  On  the  Birth  of  the  Prince  of  Wales  (1762). 

2  On  the  Prince  of  Wales's  Birth  1762  by  William  Henley  Esq. : 

Sleep,  royal  infant,  sleep; 
Round  thee  may  guardian  powers  their  vigils  keep. 
How    little   dost   thou   know. 
Whilst  leaning  on  thy  nurse's  breast, 
Or  in  thy  mother's  arms  carest, 
The    high    important    toils    'tis    thine    to    undergo! 


48  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

worth  can  not  forecast  the  future  of  the  child  with  the  same 
certainty  as  the  earher  poets;  the  individual  is  inexplicable 
because  the  springs  of  life  are  obscure  and  because  man,  a 
law  unto  himself,  is  forever  different  from  his  fellows. 
Whatever  the  merits  of  such  an  attitude,  for  the  child  in 
poetry  it  had  a  two- fold  advantage ;  first,  that  the  poet  looked 
upon  the  child  as  an  individual  worthy  of  profound  attention 
and  study ;  and  secondly,  it  followed  from  this,  that  any 
manifestation  of  his  individuality  in  mood  or  action  was  a 
fit  subject  for  poetry. 

Because  he  is  interested  in  the  child  for  what  he  is  nozu — 
a  fresh  natural  being — rather  than  for  what  he  may  become 
through  training  (compare  Entile),  Wordsworth  in  the  pres- 
ence of  Hartley  Coleridge  is  preoccupied  with  the  problem 
of  catching  the  secret  of  his  individuality.  But  the  fleetmg 
moods  of  this  faery  voyager  among  men  baffled  direct 
analysis.  Wordsworth  therefore  applies  transcendental 
philosophy  clothed  in  vague,  skyey  imagery.  The  child's 
fancies  are  brought  from  afar ;  he  makes  a  mockery  of  words 
and  fits  to  unutterable  thoughts  'The  breeze-like  motions 
and  the  self-born  carol."  He  is  a  faery  voyager  whose  boat 
seems  less  to  float  on  earthly  streams  than  to  brood  on  air. 
The  child's  thought  life  is  so  ethereal  that  he  lives  as  though 

Suspended  in  a  stream  as  clear  as  sky, 

Where   earth   and    heaven   do   make   one   imagery. 

Though  the  poet  is  sufficiently  practical  to  fear  for  the  fu- 
ture of  such  a  child,  he  is  attracted  by  the  very  excess  of 
individuality  which  arouses  his  fears : 

O  blessed  vision !  happy  child ! 
Thou  art  so  exquisitely  wild. 

Hartley  is  so  delicately  constituted  as  to  be  unfitted  for  the 
unkind  shocks  and  soiHng  tasks  of  life.  He  is  "a  dew-drop, 
which  the  morn  brings  forth,"  that  "glitters  while  it  lives," 


IN   OUR    INFANCY  49 

But,   at   the   touch   of   wrong,    without   a   strife 
Slips  in  a  moment  out  of  life. 

As  the  poet  looks  into  the  future,  he  feels  that  nature  will 
be  good  to  the  child  by  taking  him  off  before  worldly  mat- 
ters bring  grief  and  melancholy  that  he  can  not  endure ;  or 
nature  will  keep  him  a  child  always  and  preserve  him 

by   individual    right. 
A   young   lamb's    heart    among   the    full-grown    flocks. 

Thought  and  imagery  are  here  in  sharp  contrast  to  the 
clearly  defined  outhnes  of  Prior.  Though  Wordsworth's 
analysis  is  evanescent  in  effect,  and  though  he  at  times  seems 
to  destroy  physical  reality  in  attempting  to  interpret  the 
child's  personality,  we  know  from  Coleridge's  account  that 
Hartley  was  an  unusual  if  not  abnormal  child.  Wordsworth 
was  not  fantastic,  but  had  his  eye  on  the  child.  This  is 
evident  from  Coleridge's  own  remarks : 

Hartley  is  a  spirit  that  dances  on  an  aspen  leaf;  the  air  that 
yonder  sallow-faced  and  yawning  tourist  is  breathing,  is  to  my  babe 
a  perpetual  nitrous  oxide.  Never  was  more  joyous  creature  born. 
Pain  with  him  is  so  wholly  trans-substantiated  by  the  joys  that  had 
rolled  on  before,  and  rushed  on  after,  that  oftentimes  five  minutes 
after  his  mother  has  whipt  him  he  has  gone  up  and  asked  her  to 
whip  him  again. 

Wordsworth  was  fascinated  by  the  unusual  personality 
revealed  in  this  child,  and  in  so  far  as  it  was  possible  with 
the  poetic  treatment  congenial  to  him,  he  has  given  a  true 
interpretation  of  Hartley  Coleridge  at  the  age  of  six.  He 
took  no  external  standards  for  granted,  but  looked  upon  the 
child  as  an  individual  worthy  of  individual  treatment  on 
the  basis  of  laws  of  conduct  revealed  in  the  child  itself. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE  GROWING  BOY 

In  my  poor  mind  it  is  most  sweet  to  muse 

Upon  the  days  gone  by;  to  act  in  thought 

Past  seasons  o'er,  and  be  again  a  child; 

To  sit  in  fancy  on  the  turf-clad  slope 

Down  which  the  child  would  roll;   to  pluck  gay  flowers, 

Make  posies  in  the  sun,  which  the  child's  hand 

(Childhood  offended  soon,  soon  reconciled) 

Would  throw  away,  and  straight  take  up  again, 

Then  fling  them  to  the  winds,  and  o'er  the  lawn 

Bound  with  so  playful  and  so  light  a  foot. 

That  the  pressed  daisy  scarce  declined  her  head. 

Childhood:  Charles  Lamb. 

Children  who  appear  in  lines  on  play  are  usually  beyond 
the  nursery  age;  they  are  old  enough  to  be  out  of  doors, 
and  to  enjoy  more  vigorous  pastimes.  In  Going  info 
Breeches,  Charles  Lamb  has  caught  the  boisterous  spirit  and 
greater  freedom  which  mark  the  transition  from  indoor 
games  to  outdoor  play. 

Puss  in  Corners,  Hide  and  Seek, 

Sports  for  girls  and  punies  weak. 

Baste  the  bear  he  now  may  play  at. 

Leap-frog,  Foot-ball,  sport  away  at. 

Show    his    skill    and    strength    at    Cricket, 

Mark    his    distance,    pitch    his    wicket. 

Run   about   in   winter's   snow 

Till  his  cheeks  and  fingers  glow. 

Climb  a  tree  or  scale  a  wall 

Without   any   fear   to   fall. 

The  early  poets,  however,  in  their  passing  notice  of  chil- 
dren, did  not  phrase  an  equally  lively  appreciation  of  the  ac- 


THE   GROWING    BOY  51 

tivities  of  the  growing  boy.  In  classicist  poetry  the  earliest 
reference  to  children  in  the  fields  associates  them  with 
flowers ;  but  had  John  Philipps  in  Cyder  shown  a  vital  sym- 
pathy with  children  at  play,  the  phrasing  of  such  an  interest 
would  have  been  exceptional.  The  early  poets,  in  the  main 
town  poets,  were  committed  to  a  consideration  of  manners 
at  the  center  of  fashion.  With  few  exceptions,  evidence 
of  interest  in  outdoor  play  appears  incidentally.  Often  the 
general  subject  is  close  to  childhood,  as  in  Shenstone's 
Schoolmistress  or  Gray's  Ode  on  a  Distant  Prospect  of 
Eton  College.  The  poet  occasionally  focused  his  attention 
on  outdoor  play  in  such  poems  as  Hoyland's  Guardian 
Angel,  Bruce's  Lochleven,  Scott's  Childhood,  Lovibond's 
Combe  Neville,  and  White's  Childhood.  Incidental  notice 
ordinarily  implies  a  generalized  conception ;  but  when  the 
personal  element  emerges,  after  the  middle  of  the  century,  it 
is  usually  accompanied  by  specific  details  that  localize  and 
individualize  the  experience. 

The  change  from  Thomson's  impersonal  attitude  to 
Wordsworth's  extended  autobiographical  recollection  is 
gradual.  The  personal  element  is  dependent  for  efifective 
realization  upon  the  poet's  willingness  to  phrase  specific 
details.  The  difference  between  this  and  generalized  de- 
scription will  be  noted  in  connection  with  play  in  fields  and 
by  the  side  of  streams.  The  full  emergence  of  the  personal 
element,  which  came  with  the  growth  of  sentiment,  will 
be  observed  in  connection  with  the  play  of  schoolboys  and 
the  poet's  fond  recollection  of  native  fields. 


From  the  days  of  Thomson,  children  are  increasingly  ob- 
served in  fields  and  woods.  Their  roving  habits  often  car- 
ried them  away  from  the  home  plot  and  village  green.     To 


52  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

be  under  the  eye  of  parents,  they  were  frequently  taken  into 
the  harvest  field  to  help  in  gleaning.  IChildren  assisting  at 
harvest  were  portrayed  at  first  as  miniature  harvesters — 
little  workers  thought  of  in  terms  of  their  elders.  As  soon 
as  poets  became  more  familiar  with  the  details  of  external 
nature,  and  as  their  growing  sympathy  with  childhood 
awakened  them  to  a  realization  that  children  are  individuals, 
poetry  reflected  those  details  which  differentiate  boys  and 
girls  from  their  elders.  Children  are  no  longer  merely  at 
work,  but  are  tempted  in  child  fashion  by  berries  at  the 
roadside  or  near  the  hedge. 

In  a  typically  conceived  description  of  hay-making  in 
Summer,  Thomson  notes  how 

Infant  bands 
Trail  the  long  rake,  or,  with  the  fragrant  load 
O'ercharged,  amid  the  kind  oppression  roll. 

Activity  in  which  children  must  certainly  have  taken  part 
is  suggested  without  specifically  connecting  with  them  the 
''blended  voice"  that  was  "heard  from  dale  to  dale."  In 
Amwell,  Scott  is  equally  general  in  his  lines  on  the  annual 
recurrence  of 

The  shouts  of  harvest,  and  the  prattling  train 
Of  cheerful  gleaners. 

Little  advance  is  shown  by  Wordsworth  in  a  late  sonnet 
("Intent  on  gathering  wool  from  hedge  and  brake")  in 
which  he  notices  unaccompanied  children.  They  work  glee- 
fully in  expectation  that  a  "poor  old  Dame"  will  bless  them 
for  their  gift.  Closer  observation  is  revealed  in  the  early 
sonnet  "Sweet  was  the  walk  along  the  narrow  lane"  (1792, 
or  earlier),  in  which  childhood  traits  are  sympathetically 
noticed.  The  children  accompanied  their  elders,  who  were 
gleaning  tufts  of  hay  caught  by  a  hawthorn  hedge  from  the 


THE   GROWING    HOV  53 

loaded  wagon  as  it  passed  down  the  lane.  While  seeming 
to  be  even  busier  than  their  elders  in  plying  the  "little  rake," 
they  at  the  same  time  "with  cunning  sidelong  look"  saun- 
tered to  ''pluck  the  strawberries  wild  unseen."  Words- 
worth has  more  than  once  associated  children  with  straw- 
berries. In  another  passage,  in  Epistle  to  Beaumont  ( i8i  i ) , 
he  notes  that  the  strawberries  he  enjoyed  at  an  early-morn- 
ing breakfast  in  the  lowly  grange  in  Yewdale  had  been 
gathered  from  lane  and  woodside.  Poured  in  hillocks,  they 
were  the  "offering  wild  of  children's  industry." 

The  story  of  children  in  field  and  wood  is  not  complete 
without  mention  of  berrypicking  and  nutting  expeditions. 
These  are  part  of  the  unpublished  seasonal  schedule  of 
childhood  pastimes.  As  was  to  be  expected,  earlier  poets 
are  concerned  with  practical  considerations.  ^  Poems  on 
subjects  of  husbandry,  like  The  Hop-Garden,  The  Fleece, 
or  The  Sugarcane,  reveal  a  matter-of-fact  attitude  that  is 
very  different  from  the  personal  point  of  view  of  more  in- 
spired moralists  like  Cowper  and  Wordsworth.  When,  in 
Agriculture,  Dodsley  notices  the  problem  of  children  wand- 
ering in  the  fields,  he  is  preoccupied  with  the  dangers  that 
beset  the  hungry  child  who  is  tempted  to  taste  of  the  "allur- 
ing fruit"  of  the  deadly  nightshade.  As  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  poet  is  reading  a  lecture  to  farmers  on  the  dangers  of 
ill-weeded  and  unkept  fields.  He  does  not  spare  realistic 
details  of  the  various  steps  that  lead  up  to  the  hideous  death 
of  the  child  who  has  unwarily  eaten  poisonous  berries.     The 

^  This  attitude  persists  in  later  poetry.  In  The  Oak  and  the 
Broom  (1800),  as  Wordsworth  contemplates  the  broom  precariously 
growing  in  a  fissure  of  rock,  he  fears  for  the  little  witless  shepherd 
boy  who  may  be  tempted  some  sultry  noon  to  slumber  in  the  branches 
of  this  lightly-rooted  tree.  Cowper  has  the  "little  ones"  from  the 
village  gather  kingcups  and  daisies,  but  also  a  cheap  and  wholesome 
salad  from  the  brook  (The  Task,  VI). 


54  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

passage  closes  with  an  apostrophe  to  Providence,  which 
has  concealed  poison  in  a  form  so  tempting.  Dodsley  can 
not  understand  why  this  bane  should  be  allowed  to  grow 
''so  near  the  path  of  innocents."  Numerous  passages  show 
that  nightshade  seems  to  have  been  especially  feared.  Scott 
in  Rural  Scenery  calls  upon  shepherds  to  warn  children  (who 
roam  "beside  the  public  way")  against  the  pernicious  plants 
that  spring  from  rank  soils,  and  especially  against  the  dead- 
ly juice  with  which  the  "nightshade's  berry  swells."  In 
Rural  Business  he  is  less  sombre  when  giving  harvest  counsel 
which  is  timed  by  reference  to  the  season  when  bramble 
berries  change  from  red  to  black, 

And  boys  for  nuts  the  hazel  copses  range. 

In  his  lines  To  Contemplation,  White  shows  an  attempt 
to  individualize.     He  loves  to  listen  to 

the  little  peasant's  song, 
Wandering  lone  the  glens  among, 
His  artless  lip  with  berries  dyed, 
And   feet   through    ragged    shoes    descried. 

At  an  earlier  date,  the  personal  element  appears  in 
Hoyland's  lines  to  his  guardian  angel  ("Sweet  angel  of  my 
natal  hour"),  one  of  the  tenderest  poems  of  the  century. 
He  recalls  how  he  was  led  by  "simple  Nature"  and  was 
guarded  from  harm : 

'Twas  thou,  whene'er  I  ranged  the  mead, 
That  drew  me  from  the  pois'nous  weed 

Of  tempting  purple  dye; 
That  drew  me  from  the  fatal  brake, 
Where,  coiled  in  speckled  pride,  the  snake 

Allured  my  longing  eye.i 

1  Thomas  Day's  Sandford  and  Mertoun  contains  a  snake  episode 
very  much  like  that  developed  in  Mary  Lamb's  unconvincing  The 
Boy  and  the  Snake  (in  which  little  Henry  shares  his  breakfast  with 
a  snake  which  he  calls  familiarly  "Grey  Pate.") 


THE    GROWING    BOY  55 

The  personal  note  is  clearly  heard  also  in  one  of  Cow- 
per's  finest  autobiographical  passages  in  The  Task : 

E'er  since,  a  truant  boy,  1  passed  my  bounds, 
To  enjoy  a  ramble  on  the  banks  of  Thames; 
And  still  remember,  nor  without  regret. 
Of   hours   that   sorrow    since    has    much    endeared, 
How  oft,  my  slice  of  pocket-store  consumed. 
Still  hungering,  pennyless.  and  far  from  home, 
I  fed  on  scarlet  hips  and  stony  haws, 
Or  blushing  crabs,  or  berries  that  emboss 
The  bramble,  black  as  jet,  or  sloes  austere. 
Hard  fare!  but  such  as  boyish  appetite 
Disdains  not,  nor  the  palate,  undepraved 
By  culinary  art.  unsavoury  deems. 

In  the  autobiographical  poem  {Nutting,  1799)  which  re- 
cords a  destructive  visit  to  hazel  coppices  near  Lake  Esth- 
waite,  Wordsworth  recalls  one  day  singled  out  from  many, 
"One  of  those  heavenly  days  that  cannot  die."  He  pictures 
the  boy  with  "huge  wallet"  slung  over  his  shoulders,  a 
nutting  crook  in  hand,  and  dressed  in  ragged  clothes  saved 
by  frugal  Dame  Tyson  against  the  time  when  he  would  en- 
counter thorns  and  brambles.  In  lines  which  vigorously 
respond  to  his  recollection  of  having  "dragged  to  earth  both 
branch  and  bough"  he  bears  witness  to  that  rough  and 
unfeeling  nature  which  is  traditionally  associated  with  boys 
of  a  certain  age. 

The  same  change  from  early-century  incidental  and  gen- 
eralized notice  to  late-century  personal  recollection  or  in- 
dividualization may  be  observed  in  other  phases  of  the 
growing  boy's  outdoor  activities.  In  SiiDinier,  Thomson's 
passage  on  sheep  shearing  merely  notices 

The  clamour  much  of  men,  and  boys,  and  dogs, 


56  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

and  glances  aside  to  the  sturdy  boy  "glorying  in  his  might" 
as  he  holds  the  indignant  ram  by  its  ''twisted  horns."  In 
his  Sugarcane  Grainger  flattens  out  this  incident  by  refer- 
ence to  the  ''infant  throng"  who  "proud  of  their  prowess" 
attempt  to  hold  the  "struggling  ram."  In  his  Fleece,  Dyer 
fails  to  visualize  children  who  were  present  at  the  sheep- 
shearing  festival  of  sprinkling  the  rivers  with  flowers,  in 
fact  does  not  bring  them  into  his  picture  beyond  noting 
that  "their  little  ones  look  on  delighted."  Sentiment  colors 
Scott's  treatment.  The  beauty  of  the  flowers  which  his 
swain  plucks  for  Delia  is  enhanced  because  he  gathers  them 
during  the  evening  hours  when  village  children  stray  in  the 
green  meadows.  More  romantic  also  is  Cowper's  ideal  of 
freedom  (Retirement) ,  which  finds  perfect  expression  in  the 
shepherd  boy  who  unfolds  his  flock  at  the  first  breeze  of 
dawn  when  glittering  dew-drops  are  on  the  thorn.  The 
boy  unconsciously  enjoys  the  essence  of  freedom  while  he 
sits  under  bank  or  bush,  linking  cherry  stones  or  plaiting 
rushes.  Do  not  ask  him  how  fair  freedom  is — he  has 
never  known  another  state.  In  carefree  mood  he  carves 
his  "rustic  name"  upon  a  tree. 

Wordsworth's  shepherd  boys  are  vitally  conceived. 
They  are  less  placid  than  earlier  poetic  children,  and  also 
more  mischievous.  In  Luke,  who  caught  at  the  legs  of 
sheep,  and  "with  shouts  scared  them"  while  they  were  un- 
der the  shears,  or  who  stood  at  the  gate  in  the  fields  "some- 
thing between  a  hindrance  and  a  help,"  may  be  observed  a 
child  who  is  far  removed  from  the  theoretical  children  of 
the  earlier  poets.  In  The  Idle  Shepherd-Boys;  or,  Dun- 
geon-Ghyll  Force,  a  Pastoral  (1800),  Wordsworth  gives 
lively  glimpses  of  the  changing  moods  of  careless  boys  who 
neglect  duty  for  play.     They  are  sitting  beneath  a  rock, 


THE   GROWING    BOY  57 

Their  work,  if  any  work  they  have, 
Is  out  of  mind — or  done. 

On  whistles  fashioned  from  branches  of  a  sycamore  tree 
they  are  playing  snatches  from  a  Christmas  hymn.  As 
a  livelier  mood  overtakes  them  they  run  a  race  for  one  of 
the  whistles  as  a  prize.  In  the  midst  of  the  race  one  dares 
the  other  to  follow  him  on  a  natural  bridge  of  rock  over 
the  chasm  made  by  the  waterfall.  The  challenger,  "all  eyes 
and  feet,"  with  staff  in  hand  as  a  balance,  is  half  way  across 
when  he  hears  the  bleat  of  a  lamb  that  had  washed  over  the 
waterfall  into  the  pool  beneath.  At  this  moment  the  poet 
appears  and  assists  them  in  extricating  the  swirling  lamb, 
but  not  without  gentle  admonishment  to  ''better  mind  their 
trade." 

Children  at  play  by  river  and  stream  have  been  noticed 
repeatedly.  The  range  is  from  merely  incidental  notice  to 
extended  observation.  They  may  be  gathering  flowers  on 
the  bankside,  or  may  be  at  play  in  the  water  or  upon  it  Al- 
though poets  usually  prefer  to  emphasize  the  happiness  of 
children,  play  by  the  water  does  not  always  have  a  happy 
ending,  and  poets  have  not  been  slow,  especially  in  ballads 
and  narrative  poems,  to  employ  the  pathetic  incident  of  a 
drowned  child.  ^ 

In  Summer,  Thomson  has  described  with  more  than 
customary  detail  a  youthful  swimmer  who  is  enjoying  a 
bath  in  a  favorite  swimming  hole  which  shows  a  sandy 
bottom. 

1  Charles  Lamb  has  developed  this  motive  in  To  a  River  in 
Which  a  Child  was  Drowned.  Compare  also  the  kidnapping  scene 
in  Wilkie's  Epigoniad,  where  the  child's  curiosity  leads  to  his  cap- 
ture. See  also  Petherton  Bridge,  An  Elegy,  inscribed  to  the  Rev. 
Mr.  Bean,  by  Mr.  Gerrard  ('in  The  Lady's  Poetical  Magazine  or 
Beauties  of  British  Poetry.     London,  1781^. 


58  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Awhile  he  stands 
Gazing  the  inverted  landscape,  half  afraid 
To  meditate  the  blue  profound  below; 
Then    plunges    headlong    down    the    circling    flood. 
His  ebon  tresses  and  his  rosy  cheek 
Instant  emerge;  and  through  the  obedient  wave, 
At  each  short  breathing  by  his  lip  repelled, 
With  arms  and  legs  according  well,  he  makes 
As  humour  leads,  an  easy-winding  path ; 
While,  from  his  polished  sides,  a  dewy  light 
Effuses  on  the  pleased  spectators  round. 

Thomson  enjoyed  his  description.  His  enthusiasm,  perhaps 
stimulated  by  recollection  of  his  boyhood  feats  in  the  Scot- 
tish Tweed,  leads  him  into  an  encomium  on  swimming, 
which,  he  beHeves,  not  only  exhilarates  the  body  but  knits 
the  Hmbs.  The  mind  too  receives  a  sympathetic  toning  up 
from  the  glow  of  life  in  the  body.  His  faith  in  the  efficacy 
of  winter  baths  in  the  open  shows  that  he  was  a  cold-water 
enthusiast,  and  believed  with  Locke  in  hardening  the  child's 
body.  He  finally  takes  shelter  in  an  historical  parallel. 
The  mighty  Roman  arm  that  conquered  the  world  had 
learned  "while  tender,  to  subdue  the  wave." 

Blair  shows  originality  by  bringing  the  ''children  gath- 
ering flowers"  motive  into  connection  with  a  youngster  at 
play  by  the  side  of  a  rivulet.  The  episode  is  included  with- 
in the  limits  of  a  similitude,  which  is  extended,  however,  to 
nine  blank  verse  lines.  In  spite  of  its  sombre  mood  and 
bald  moralizing,  Blair's  Graz/e  (1743)  is  nevertheless  for 
the  lover  of  children  one  of  the  most  rewarding  of  earlier 
poems.  Blair  seems  to  look  upon  childhood  as  a  rich  mine 
of  illustrations.  In  his  lines  on  the  irresolute  youngster, 
the  faithful  details  reveal  a  lively  and  half-amused  interest. 
The  boy  has  been  attracted  by  flowers  on  the  opposite  bank. 
Poetic  diction  hardly  obscures  Blair's  sympathetic  obser- 
vation in  the  line  which  introduces  the  growing  fear  of  the 


THE    GROWING    BOY  59 

boy :  "How  wishfully  he  looks  to  stem  the  tide."  His 
analysis  of  the  fluctuating  resolve,  until  the  boy  dips  his 
foot  into  the  water,  after  which  his  fears  are  redoubled, 
so  that  he  runs  off  unmindful  of  the  flowers  on  the  farther 
bank,  is  done  with  care  for  details.  ^ 

Gray's  lines  on  swimming  in  the  Ode  on  a  Distant  Pros- 
pect of  Eton  College  are  generalized.  His  muse  led  him  to 
wonder  what  Eton  boys  were  now  bathing  in  Thames. 

Say,    Father   Thames,    for   thou   hast    seen 

Full  many  a  sprightly  race 
Disporting  on  thy  margent  green 

The  paths  of  pleasure  trace, 
Who  foremost  now  delight  to  cleave 
With  pliant  arm  thy  glassy  wave  ? 

In  Levcn-lVater,  even  the  author  of  Peregrine  Pickle  could 
wax  sentimental  over  the  "pure  stream"  in  whose  "trans- 
parent wave"  he  had  bathed  his  youthful  limbs.  In  Auld 
Lang  Syne  Burns  recalls  how 

We   twa   hae  paidl'd    in   the   burn, 
Frae  morning  sun  till  dine. 

In  The  Prelude  Wordsworth  is  likewise  more  personal 
than  Gray  in  his  recollection  of  how  he  had  made  "one  long 
bathing  of  a  summer's  day"  in  the  Derwent,  which  flowed 
at  the  foot  of  his  father's  garden.  He  has  painstakingly 
localized  the  experience. 

the  bright  blue  river  passed 
Along  the  margin  of  our  terrace  walk ; 
A   tempting   playmate    whom    we    dearly    loved. 
Oh,  many  a  time  have  I,  a  five  years'  child. 

1  Compare  The  Stepping-Stones.  Wordsworth  does  not  devel- 
op the  situation  beyond  the  lines, 

Here  the  Child 
Puts,    when    the    high-swoln    Flood    runs    fierce    and    wild, 
His  budding  courage  to  the  proof. 


60  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

In    a    small    mill-race    severed    from    his    stream, 
Made  one  long  bathing  of  a  summer's  day; 
Basked  in  the  sun.  and  plunged  and  basked  again 
Alternate,  all  a  summer's  day.  .    .    .    (Book  I) 

In  Winter,  Thomson  has  given  a  composite  picture  of 
tobogganing  and  skating  scenes  that  are  international  in 
their  subject-matter.  He  has  not  overlooked  the  ''happiest 
of  all  the  train,"  who  is  none  other  than  the  ''raptured  boy" 
lashing  his  whirling  top.  He  is  not  individualized  farther 
than  that.  In  Vicissitude,  Mickle  notes  a  boy  who  returns 
at  night  from  "his  day-sport  on  the  ice-bound  stream." 
Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  is  specific  and  individual  in 
his  skating  scene,  even  to  the  precise  statement  of  the  hour 
when  Hawkeshead  boys  began  the  game  of  hunt  the  hare, 
and  caused  an  uproar  that  was  echoed  by  the  precipices. 
They  spread  their  coats  to  the  wind  and  scudded  down  the 
lake.  Wordsworth's  lines  are  suggestive  of  the  keen  frosty 
air  and  the  sense  of  bodily  strength  and  animal  vigor 
which  made  these  boys  wheel  about  exultingly  like  an  un- 
tired  horse  that  cares  not  for  its  home.  It  was  a  tumultuous 
throng  that  hissed  along  the  ice.  Although  the  youthful 
Wordsworth  often  left  the  uproar  to  skate  by  himself  in 
a  quiet  bay  or  to  cut  across  the  reflection  of  a  star,  and  al- 
though he  reports  one  unusual  experience  when  he  stopped 
so  suddenly  while  in  full  career  that  the  clififs  were  moving 
past  him  as  though  he  beheld  the  visible  motions  of  the 
earth,  yet  the  passage,  more  than  any  other  that  is  descrip- 
tive of  his  adventures  in  field  and  on  mountain,  depends  on 
y.  sense  impression  for  its  effect.  The  gleam  is  there,  but  it 
is  subordinated  to  a  keen  sense  of  boyish  delight  in  animal 
motions.  Natural  phenomena  of  winter  impressed  them- 
selves upon  this  sensitive  boy  even  while  he  was  enjoying  a 
game  of  loo  or  whist  in  Dame  Tyson's  cottage;  the  game 
was  often  interrupted  by  splitting  fields  of  ice  on  Esthwaite 


THE    GROWING    ROY  61 

when   the   pent-up   air   in   freeing   itself  made   "loud   pro- 
tracted yelling"  like  howling  wolves. 

II 

Some  of  the  most  exhilarating  lines  in  the  early  poems 
picture  the  delight  of  children  just  out  of  school.  To  illus- 
trate the  mad  scamper  of  the  freed  pack  from  the  kennel, 
Somerville  in  The  Chase  refers  in  an  epic  simile  to  boys  who 
rush  from  school  and  "give  a  loose  to  all  their  frolic  play." 
In  The  Schoolmistress,  Shenstone's  schoolboy,  his  task  done, 
ran  forth  with  "jocund  sprite"  to  freedom  and  to  joy. 
Somerville's  enthusiasm  for  the  chase  rises  so  high  that 
everyone  leaves  his  occupation  at  the  huntsman's  call,  even 
to  the  schoolboy  who  does  not  heed  his  master,  but  flies  from 
his  prison.  Mason  makes  his  point  in  political  verses  by 
comparing  unfaithful  legislators  who  have  "quit  St. 
Stephen's  dome"  to  truant  schoolboys  roaming  with  hound 
and  horn.  In  Syr  Martyn,  Mickle  rounds  out  the  picture 
of  youthful  truants,  who  probably  came  honestly  by  their 
British  love  of  outdoor  sport.  Mickle's  youngster  is  stand- 
ing on  a  "green  bank,"  in  his  hands  an  "ashen  rod"  which 
obeys  his  guileful  hands.  He  leads  the  mimic  fly  across  the 
way  of  a  wary  trout.  He  succeeds  in  hooking  his  quarry, 
evidently  to  the  admiration  of  the  poet,  who  finally  enters 
into  the  situation  with  enthusiasm.  This  is  reflected  in  the 
minute  details  which  bear  witness  to  the  skill  of  the  young 
fisherman,  who  showed  himself  precocious  at  fly  casting 
if  not  at  his  books. 

Late  in  the  century  Bampfylde  inclines  to  specific  details 
while  quaintly  visualizing 

the  boisterous   string 
Of   school-imps,    freed    from   dame's   all   dreaded    sight, 
Round  the  village  cross,  in  many  a  wanton  ring.  ^ 

1  To  the  Evening. 


62  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Mary  Lamb's  detached  poem  The  Journey  from  School  and 
to  School  tries  to  catch  the  spirit  of  youngsters  ''jumbled 
all  together"  in  a  coach : 

Sometimes  we  laugh  aloud  aloud, 

Sometimes  huzzah,  huzzah, 
Who  is  so  buoyant,  free,  and  proud, 
As  we  home-travelers  are? 
In  The  Prelude,  Wordsworth  recalls  the  "noisy  crew" 
at  Hawkeshead  with  their  "round  of  tumult."     They  were 
"mad  at  their  sports  like  withered  leaves  in  winds."     It  was 
a  "race  of  real  children"  who  were  "bandied  up  and  down 
by  love  and  hate."     In  The  Excursion  he  carries  on  the  tra- 
ditional figure  of  unwilling  inmates  of  the  schoolroom  and 
their  glad  release.     The  boys  of  the  parsonage  were 
A  few  short  hours  of  each  returning  day 
The  thriving  prisoners  of  the  village  school: 
And  thence  let  loose,  to  seek  their  pleasant  homes 
Or  range  the  grassy  lawn  in  vacancy. 
The    open    space   known   as    the   village    green,    which 
often  was  adjacent  to  the  highway,  may  be  looked  upon  as 
the  eighteenth-century  public  playground  for  children.     In 
The  Schoolmistress,  when  "Liberty"  has  unbarred  her  prison 
door,  children  run  pell-mell  from  school, 

And  now  the  grassy  cirque  had  covered  o'er 
With  boisterous  revel-rout  and  wild  uproar; 

A  thousand  ways  in  wanton  rings  they  run. 

* 

See  in  each  sprite  some  various  bent  appear. 

These  rudely  carol  most  incondite   lay; 

Those  sauntering  on  the  green,   with  jocund   leer 

Salute  the  stranger  passing  on  his  way; 

Some  builden  fragile  tenements  of  clay; 

Some  to  the  standing  lake  their  courses  bend, 

With  pebbles  smooth  at  duck  and  drake  to  play,  i 

1  It    is    a    pity    that    the    realistically    conceived    passages    of 

Shenstone,  West,  and  Mickle  are  hobbled  with  Spenserian  archaisms. 

These  poets  were,  of  course,  writing  in  the  satirical  tradition;  but 

they   did   observe   childhood   with   more    than   customary   sympathy. 


THE    GROWING    BOY  63 

The  generalized  observation  of  children  at  play  and  in 
mischief  on  city  streets  or  on  the  highway  goes  back  as 
far  at  least  as  Swift.  Merciless  in  the  exposure  of  sham 
and  vanit}',  he  delighted  to  think  of  children  who  in  chorus 
heap  ridicule  upon  a  pompous  person.  Shenstone  noted 
how  youngsters  out  of  school  mockingly  salute  passers-by. 
Soame  Jenyns  took  up  the  theme  in  The  American  Coach- 
nian,  where  the  horses  become  unmanageable  and  run  away. 
In  a  few  well  chosen  phrases  he  enters  into  the  spirit  of  the 
boys  who  enjoy  the  excitement,  and  by  bawling  of  "Stop 
them !  Stop  them !  till  they're  hoarse"  mean  only  to  make 
the  horses  run  faster.  This  phase  of  children's  activities  is 
probably  best  known  from  Cowper's  incidental  lines  in 
John  Gilpin.  Here,  again,  dogs  bark,  children  scream,  and 
everyone  bawls  out  ''well  done"  as  poor  Gilpin  gallops  help- 
lessly down  the  street.  ^  The  satirical  tradition  is  carried 
on  in  Chatterton's  Resignation  where 

A  lengthening  train  of  boys   displayed  him  great, 
He  seemed  already  minister  of  state. 

Chatterton   asks   in   the   Epistle   to   the   Rev.   Mr.    Catcott 

(1769), 

What  pattern  of  humility  and  truth 

Can    bear   the    jeering    ridicule    of    youth? 

In  Kew  Gardens  he  alludes  to  the  motive  in  a  similitude : 

Your   infant   muse    should    sport   with    other    toys, 
Man  will  not  bear  the  ridicule  of  boys. 

In  the  same  poem  he  ridicules  the  officers  of  trainbands  who 
are  stirred  to  action  "When  some  bold  urchin  beats  his  drum 
in  sport." 

1  Compare  Cowper's  letter  (Edition  Wright,  Vol.  Ill,  page  59)  : 
"My  brother  drove  up  and  down  Olney  in  quest  of  us,  almost  as 
often  as  you  up  and  down  Chancery  Lane  in  quest  of  the  Madans, 
with  fifty  boys  and  girls  at  his  tail,  htlort  he  could  find  us." 


64  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Crabbe  and  Wordsworth  modify  the  theme  to  suit 
special  situations  such  as  a  village  burial  or  celebration  of 
victory.  In  this  instance  as  in  others  that  have  to  do  with 
children  at  play  or  their  life  in  the  nursery,  the  close  ob- 
servation of  the  satirists  has  been  carried  over  by  later  poets 
into  their  dominant  mood  of  respect  and  reverence.  The 
motive  still  heightens  effect,  but  the  poet's  intention  is  no 
longer  satirical.  Crabbe  sees  idle  children  who,  while  wand- 
ering about  a  newly-made  grave,  take  on  the  ''tone  of  woe." 
In  The  Village  (1783),  children  suspend  play  'To  see  the 
bier  that  bears  their  ancient  friend."  He  had  been  one 
with  them  in  all  their  idle  sports,  had  formed  the  "pliant 
bow,"  the  "flying  ball,"  and  had  also  constructed  a  bat  and 
wicket  for  them.  Wordsworth  was  stirred  by  the  possibili- 
ty of  a  Napoleonic  invasion.  His  thoughts  were  absorbed 
by  the  danger  which  threatened  his  beloved  England.  In- 
cluded in  the  sonnets  dedicated  to  National  Independence 
and  Liberty  is  Anticipation,  which  celebrates  an  expected 
victory  over  Napoleon  on  British  ground.  The  poet  calls 
on  old  men  to  come  forth  and  on  wives  to  make  merry ;  but 
the  accompaniment  of  childish  noises  is  not  overlooked, 
even  to  those  of  infants  in  arms. 

ye  little  children,   stun 
Your   grandame's    ears    with    pleasure    of   your   noise! 
Clap,  infants,  clap  your  hands ! 

Curiously  enough,  the  most  detailed  late-century  ac- 
count of  games  on  the  green  occurs  in  Childhood  of  the 
gloom-ridden  White.  When  the  dame's  school  had  been 
dismissed,  the  dame  sat  spinning  before  her  cottage,  and 
"o'er  her  spectacles  would  often  peer"  to  watch  the  gam- 
bols of  her  scholars. 

What   clamorous    throngs,    what   happy   groups    were    seen, 

In  various  postures   scattering  o'er  the  green. 

Some  shoot  the  marble,  others  join  the  chase 

Of  self-made  stag,  or  run  the  emulous  race; 


THE    GROWING    BOV  65 

While  others,  seated  on  the  dappled  grass. 

With  doleful  tales  the  light-winged  minutes  pass. 

Well  I  remember  how,  with  gesture  starched, 

A  band  of  soldiers  oft  with  pride  we  marched ; 

For  banners,  to  a  tall  ash  we  did  bind 

Our  handkerchiefs,  flapping  to  the  whistling  wind; 

And  for  our  warlike  arms  we  sought  the  mead, 

And  guns  and  spears  we  made  of  brittle  reed ; 

Then,  in  uncouth  array,  our  feats  to  crown, 

We  stormed  some  ruined  pigstye   for  a  town. 

Wordsworth  pictures  an  equally  wholesome  afternoon's 
sport  on  a  bowling  green  picturesquely  laid  out  on  the 
garden  slope  above  the  Lion  Inn  on  Lake  Windermere. 
Boys  from  Hawkeshead  had  to  walk  to  the  western  shore 
of  the  lake,  and  then  row  across  to  the  inn. 

There,    while    through    half    an    afternoon    we    played 
On  the  smooth  platform,  whether  skill  prevailed 
Or  happy  blunder  triumphed,  bursts  of  glee 
Made  all  the   mountains   ring. 

Sentiment  often  colours  side  glances  to  play.  In  Pollio 
(1762),  Mickle  feels  in  harmony  with  his  surroundings  on 
a  peaceful  evening  while  "playful  schoolboys  wanton  o'er 
the  green."  In  Lochlevcn  Bruce  draws  an  idyllic  picture 
of  a  happy  valley  in  which,  for  once,  girls  with  golden  hair 
trip  nimble-footed  on  the  green,  and  wanton  in  their  play 
with  "blooming  boys."  Grandsires  of  the  village  sit  in 
"reverend  row"  in  the  sunshine  before  the  gate,  and  shake 
their  "aged  locks  with  joy"  while  they  recall  "well  remem- 
bered stories  of  their  youth."  ^     In  Blake's  Nurse's  Song 

1  Compare  The  Deserted  Village : 

The    young    contending    as    the    old    surveyed. 
Mr.  Hudson's  Ode  to  Fancy  gives  a  picture  of  dancing  swains  and 
damsels : 

The  simple  notes,  and  merry  gambols  fire 

(Placed    by    the    hawthorne-hedge)    each    ancient    sire. 


66  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

the  heart  of  the  poet  is  made  glad  by  the  sounds  of  chil- 
dren at  play  on  the  green.  In  their  reply  to  the  nurse's  sug- 
gestion that  the  sun  has  gone  down  and  it  is  time  to  stop 
play,  the  words  of  the  children  suggest  a  typically  English 
pastoral  background : 

in  the  sky  the  little  birds  fly, 
And  the  hills  are  all   covered  with   sheep. 

The  sentimental  note  is  heard  as  soon  as  the  poet  recol- 
lects his  own  early  play.  In  this  mood  the  generalized  in- 
terest in  happy  children  tends  to  give  way  to  a  keen  realiza- 
tion of  the  difference  between  the  cares  and  sorrows  of 
manhood  and  the  undisturbed  happiness  of  childhood. 

Althougli  Gray  feels  a  "momentary  bliss"  as  he  thinks  of 
schoolboy  play  at  Eton,  his  recollections  induce  melancholy 
musings.  The  ''little  victims"  at  play  in  the  years  when 
ignorance  is  bliss  are  "regardless  of  their  doom."  Unlike 
the  hardier  truants  of  Somerville  and  Mickle,  they  snatch 
a  fearful  joy  outside  the  bounds  set  by  school  authorities. 

Some  bold  adventurers  disdain 
The  limits  of  their  little  reign, 

And  unknown  regions  dare  descry; 
Still  as  they  run  they  look  behind. 
They  hear  a  voice  in  every  wind, 

And  snatch  a  fearful  joy. 

Within  bounds  the  "idle  progeny"  chase  the  "rolling  circle's 
speed"  or  "urge  the  flying  ball."  The  play  of  these  school- 
boys may  have  been  in  fact  "redolent  of  joy  and  youth,"  but 
Gray's  melancholy  lines  do  not  call  to  mind  lively,  scamper- 
ing children.  They  may  have  quarreled  and  have  forgotten 
their  tears  "as  soon  as  shed,"  but  the  sombre  muse  of  the 
poet  hardly  allows  him  to  enter  into  sports  as  tame  as  those 
recorded.  It  is  perhaps  unjust  to  say  that  the  lines  are 
frigid,  but  the  glow,  if  indeed  it  is  reflected  at  all,  is  cer- 


THE    GROWING    BOY  67 

tainly  dull.  The  muse  of  Gray  did  not  find  congenial  matter 
in  the  coarser  pleasures  and  glad  animal  spirits  of  children. 
Their  activities  are  sicklied  o'er  with  a  pale  cast  of  thought.^ 
Yet  in  his  contemplation  of  lawns  and  flowerets,  the 
thought  of  children  tripping  lightly  over  them  came  to  Gray 
with  such  peculiar  grace  that  he  has  written  what  is  probab- 
ly the  most  poetic  line  on  childhood  in  the  eighteenth  cen- 
tury. It  occurs  in  the  "redbreast"  stanza,  which  was  first 
printed  just  ahead  of  the  epitaph  in  the  third  edition  of  the 
Elegy.  Unfortunately  it  was  later  canceled,  for  Gray  has 
written  opposite  the  stanza  in  the  Pembroke  MS.,  "Omitted, 
I753-" 

There  scattered  oft,  the  earliest  of  the  year, 

By   hands   unseen,   are   showers   of   violets    found ; 

The  red-breast  loves  to  build,  and  warble  there, 
And  little  footsteps  lightly  print  the  ground.  - 

Although  Scott's  lyric  To  Childhood  is  more  vivacious, 
it  also  is  motivated  by  the  belief  that  "ignorance  is  bliss." 
Scott  and  Gray  do  not  link  childhood  and  manhood.  In 
their  conception,  children  are  carefree  because  they  do  not 
realize  what  life  has  in  store  for  them ;  they  are  ignorant  of 
the  ills  of  fortune  which  come  with  manhood.  Neither  Gray 
nor  Scott  looks  upon  play  as  a  preparation  for  life.  Gray 
is  moved  to  melancholy,  and  writes  in  the  mood  of  the  grave- 
yard poets.  Although  Scott  is  not  sombre,  he  too  is  moved 
to  sadness  over  what  has  been  irrevocably  lost. 

1  Contrast  Thomson's  lively  boy  (Castle  of  Indolence,  Canto  I, 
Stanza  XXV)  : 

The  lad  leaped  lightly  at  his  master's  call : 

He  was,  to  weet,  a  little  roguish  page, 

Save  sleep  and  play,  who  minded  naught  at  all. 

2  Compare  Martial's  lines  on  the  little  girl  Erotion  (Horace 
Scudder,  Childhood  in  Literature  and  Art). 


68  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Childhood!      happiest     stage     of     Hfe, 
Free  from  care  and  free  from  strife, 
Free  from  Memory's  ruthless  reign, 
Fraught  with   scenes   of   former  pain; 
Free  from  Fancy's  cruel  skill, 
Fabricating   future   ill; 
Time,  when  all  that  meets  the  view, 
All  can  charm,  for  all  is  new; 
How  thy  long-lost  hours  I  mourn, 
Never,  never  to  return! 

Then  to  toss  the  circling  ball. 
Caught  rebounding  from  the  wall ; 
Then  the  mimic  ship  to  guide 
Down  the  kennel's  dirty  tide; 
Then  the  hoop's  revolving  pace 
Through  the  dusty  street  to  chase; 
O  what  joy — it  once  was  mine, 
Childhood,  matchless  boon  of  thine! 
How  thy  long-lost  hours  I  mourn, 
Never,  never  to  return ! 

At  the  close  of  the  century  White  also  recognizes  a  break 
in  continuity,  and  mourns  the  loss  in  Childhood. 

Sweet  reign  of  innocence,   when  no   crime   defiles, 
But    each    new    object    brings    attendant    smiles; 
When  future  evils  never  haunt  the  sight, 
But  all  is  pregnant  with  unmixed  delight.  ^ 

1  Cp.   Shenstone's  conception   in  Economy: 
O   lovely   source 

Of  generous   foibles,   youth !    when   opening   minds 

Are  honest  as  the  light,  lucid  as  air. 

As  fostering  breezes  kind,  as  linnets  gay, 

Tender  as  buds,  and  lavish  as  the  Spring! 
Childhood  is  here  the  source  of  manhood;  it  is  not  a  separate  unit 
of  existence.     In  his  Schoolmistress  he  definitely  recognizes  contin- 
uity of  development  in  the  lines  on  a  youthful  bench   of  bishops. 
Wordsworth  was  familiar  with  the  poem. 


THE    GROWING    BOY  69 

In  ''Sweet  angel  of  my  natal  hour"  Hoyland  likewise  is 
saddened  by  the  dominance  of  cold  reason  in  manhood ;  but 
his  closing  stanza  seems  to  suggest  the  possibility  of  a  return 
to  the  happiness  of  childhood  days. 

Come    then,    resume    thy    guardian    pow'r, 
Sweet  angel  of  my  natal  hour, 

To    whom    the    charge    was    given ! 
Once  more  receive  me  to  thy  care, 
For  ever  kind,  for  ever  near, 

If  such  the  will  of  Heaven. 

Lovibond's  0;/  Rebuilding  Combe  Neville  recognizes 
continuity  of  development  from  the  child's  play  to  the  man's 
activities.  As  a  schoolboy  at  Kingston,  Lovibond  often 
availed  himself  of  the  rich  heritage  of  British  schoolboys — 
who,  wherever  their  school  may  be  situated,  are  certain  to 
be  within  walking  distance  of  an  abbey,  cathedral,  or  castle 
— and  roamed  within  the  precincts  of  "Neville's  ancient 
halls." 

Loved  seat,  how  oft,  in  childish  ease, 

Along  thy  woods  I  strayed, 
Now  venturous  climbed  embowering  trees, 

Now  sported  in  their  shade. 

Now,  languid  with  the  noontide  beams, 
Explored  thy  precious  springs.   .    .    . 

He  regrets  the  "improvements"  that  are  destroying  the 
favorite  spot  of  his  outdoor  play,  and  touches  lightly  on  the 
loss  of  the  carefree  spirit  of  his  early  days. 

Along  thy  hills  the  chase  I  led 

With    echoing   hounds    and    horns. 

And  left  for  thee  my  downy  bed, 
Unplanted  yet  with  thorns. 

Although  his  recollections  are  generalized,  the  poem  con- 
tains a  far-away  suggestion  of  Wordsworth's  backward  look 


70  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

that  exalts  play  hours  as  a  valuable  part  of  a  boy's  edu- 
cation. He  seems  to  believe  that  the  dreams  of  his  boyhood 
fashioned  his  manhood. 

Each   smiling  joy  was   there,   that   springs 

In  life's  delicious  prime; 
There  young  Ambition  plumed  his  wings, 

And  mocked  the  flight  of  Time. 

There  patriot  passions  fired  my  breast 

With  Freedom's  glowing  themes, 
And  Virtue's  image  rose  confessed 

In  bright  Platonic  dreams. 

Mickle  definitely  conceives  of  play  as  a  factor  in  mould- 
ing character.  His  Epitaph  on  General  Wolfe  (1759?) 
strikes  a  modern  note  in  the  desire  to  direct  a  child's  activi- 
ties by  guiding  his  play  instincts. 

Briton,  approach  with  awe  this  sacred  shrine. 

And  if  the  Father's  sacred  name  be  thine, 

If  thou  hast  marked  thy  stripling's  cheeks  to  glow 

When  war  was  mentioned,  or  the  Gallic  foe, 

If  shining  arms  his  infant  sports  employ. 

And  warm  his  rage — Here  bring  the  warlike  boy, 

Here  let  him  stand,  whilst  thou  enrapt  shalt  tell 

How  fought  the  glorious  Wolfe,  how  glorious  fell. 

Then  when  thou  mark'st  his  bursting  ardour  rise, 

Catch  his  young  hand. 

In  Bruce  and  Beattie,  interest  in  genetics  is  unmistakably 
reflected.  Bruce,  whose  love  of  remote  valleys  and  roman- 
tic glens  is  symptomatic  of  a  coming  master  like  Words- 
worth, has  Lavina  leave  her  schoolmates  at  their  play  in 
order  to  roam  in  search  of  ''curious  flower"  or  "nest  of  bird 
unknown."  In  this  way  she  learned  to  love  wild  flowers. 
An  early  sister  of  the  nature-loving  children  of  Wordsworth, 
Lavina  thus  revealed  in  her  youth  (''the  index  of  maturer 
years")  a  romantic  love  of  nature  in  solitary  haunts.     In 


THE    GROWIXG    BOV  71 

tracing  the  child's  play  in  Lochlcvcn,  Bruce  is  aware  of  its 
influence  on  character.  Reattie,  whose  intention  in  The 
Minstrel  is  to  trace  the  growth  of  a  minstrel  from  child- 
hood, notes  similar  traits  in  Edwin. 

Concourse,  and  noise,  and  toil  he  ever  fled ; 

Nor  cared  to  mingle  in  the  clamorous  fray 

Of  squabbling  imps ;  but  to  the  forest  sped 

Or    roamed    at    large    the    lonely    mountain    head, 

Or,    where    the    maze    of    some    bewildered    stream 

To  deep  untrodden  groves  his  footsteps  led.   .    .    . 

English  schoolboys  generally,  it  is  evident  from  senti- 
mental poetry,  did  not  love  birds  and  flowers  in  the  mood 
of  Lavina  and  Edwin.  Marauding  truants  rouse  the  senti- 
mental poet's  indignation.  In  The  Blackbirds  (1753)  J^g'O 
offers  to  take  the  bird's  nest  into  the  thickest  brake  "imper- 
vious to  the  schoolboy's  eye."  In  The  Goldfinches  (1735)  he 
vents  his  wrath  on  the  "ungentlest  of  his  tribe,"  a  truant 
who  had  despoiled  the  nest  of  its  brood.  The  indignant 
poet  accounts  for  the  truant's  lack  of  fine  feeling  by  refer- 
ence to  his  school  exercises,  which  reveal  no  sense  for 
harmony :  he  blunders  over  his  scrawl,  which  is  charac- 
terized by  "hideous  prosody"  and  "concord  false."  There 
seems  to  have  been  need  of  an  Audubon  society  in  the  senti- 
mental decades  of  the  eighteenth  century,  for  in  The  Linnet 
Graeme  notices  how  the  bird  had  built  her  nest  where  "no 
savage  boy"  could  find  it,  and  later  how  the  mother  linnet's 
song  did  not  protect  her  against  "The  schoolboy's  lawless 
stone." 

Cowper's  experiences  at  school,  and  his  later  humanitar- 
ian interests,  precluded  sympathy  with  outdoor  sports  even 
of  the  shepherd  boy  who,  while  his  flocks  are  peacefully 
grazing,  "snares  the  mole"  or  with  "ill-fashioned  hook" 
draws  the  "incautious  minnow"  from  the  streamlet.  The 
colorless  lines  in  themselves  give  evidence  not  only  of  Cow- 


72  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

per's  lack  of  sympathy  with  such  pastimes,  but  also  of  his 
inability  to  enter  into  the  spirit  of  the  boy  whose  rustic  sim- 
plicity otherwise  appeals  to  him.  Cowper  takes  every  op- 
portunity to  condemn  all  forms  of  sport  that  have  as  their 
object  the  killing  of  animals. 

Wordsworth,  who  especially  in  The  Prelude  looks  on 
play  in  fields  and  woods  as  an  educational  force  in  moulding 
character,  wrote  with  equal  fervor  in  defense  of  hunted 
animals,  but  was  sturdy  Englishman  enough  to  remember 
with  enthusiasm  the  joys  of  fishing  he  had  experienced 
while  a  schoolboy  at  Hawkeshead.  He  records  with  ''no  re- 
luctant voice"  how  he  and  his  mates  followed 

the  rod  and  line, 
True  symbol  of  hope's  foolishness,  whose  strong 
And  Linreproved  enchantment  led  us  on 
By  rocks  and  pools  shut  out  from  every  star, 
All  the  green  summer,  to  forlorn  cascades 
Among  the  windings  hid  of  mountain  brooks.     (I,  485-490) 

In  comparison  with  earlier  poets,  he  gains  power  in  propor- 
tion to  his  ability  to  infuse  into  the  recollection  of  his  early 
experience  something  of  the  natural  magic  of  the  mountain 
background  into  which  by  a  subtle  transformation  he  merges 
his  simple  adventures.  His  genius  interfused  with  the 
bare  statements  of  narrative  a  transcendental  interpretation 
that  in  this  instance  tends  to  obscure  the  outlines  of  fact. 
The  connotative  power  of  such  words  as  ''symbol,"  "en- 
chantment," "star,"  "forlorn,"  "windings  hid,"  which  are  in 
themselves  not  essential  to  the  story  of  his  fishing  trip,  tends 
to  carry  the  attention  away  from  merely  external  notice  of 
the  experience  to  a  consideration  of  its  significance.  He  is 
not  reproducing  the  facts  of  the  fishing  expedition,  as 
did  Mickle,  to  the  smallest  point  of  technique.  The  passage 
is  rather,  in  all  its  beauty,  an  interpretation  of  the  nuances 
which  nature  vouchsafes,  not  to  the  mighty  hunter,  who  is 


THE    GROWING    BOY  73 

bent  upon  capturing  his  prey,  but  to  the  sensitive  boy  who 
responds  to  spiritual  suggestions  of  external  nature. 
Wordsworth  tells  of  no  quarry.  Where  Somerville  and 
Mickle  enjoyed  the  physical  delights  involved  in  the  un- 
equal test  of  wits  between  man  and  animal,  Wordsworth 
went  so  far  as  to  destroy  the  efficacy  of  rod  and  line  except 
as  symbols  that  led  the  boy  into  a  land  of  enchantment. 

He  differs  from  preceding  poets  in  the  willingness  to  use 
xoncrete  details.  His  interest  lies  in  their  influence  on 
character  development.  In  The  E.vciirsion  the  two  school- 
boys who  burst  upon  the  company  in  the  parsonage  are 
"keen  anglers"  elated  with  "unusual  spoil"  (VH).  One 
bears  a  willow  pannier,  and  the  other  carries  a  smooth  blue 
stone  on  which  are  outspread  in  order  from  largest  to 
smallest  a  "store  of  gleaming  crimson-spotted  trouts."  The 
boys  tell  the  story  of  each  catch,  not  omitting  that  of  the 
'Very  monarch  of  the  brook"  who  had  escaped  them. 
Wordsworth  employs  this  solid  substratum  of  detailed  fact 
as  a  basis  for  interpretation  of  the  character  of  the  boys. 

In  the  episode  of  the  raven's  nest  in  The  Prelude,  Words- 
worth's point  of  view  stands  out  in  sharp  contrast  to  that 
of  the  sentimental  poets  who  wholly  condemned  schoolboys 
for  pilfering  nests.  When  spring  had  warmed  the  valley 
of  Yewdale,  he  and  his  companions  moved  as 

plunderers  where  the  mother  bird 
Had   in   high   places   built   her   lodge.     (I) 

Unlike  Jago  and  Graeme,  he  does  not  wholly  condemn  these 
incursions :  they  were  not  an  end  in  themselves,  but  the 
pilfering  led  to  realizations  of  spiritual  manifestations  that 
would  not  have  come  to  the  boy  from  any  other  source : 

though  mean 
Our  object  and  inglorious,  yet  the  end 
Was  not   ignoble. 


74  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

When  the  boy  has  finally  climbed  to  where  he  overhangs 
the  raven's  nest,  Wordsworth  loses  sight  of  the  quarry  in  an 
interpretation  of  the  boy's  sense  of  oneness  with  eternal 
forces. 

Oh !   when  I  have  hung 
Above  the  raven's  nest,  by  knots  of  grass 
And  half-inch  fissures  in  the  slippery  rock 
But  ill  sustained,  and  almost   (so  it  seemed) 
Suspended  by  the  blast  that  blew  amain, 
Shouldering  the  naked  crag,  oh.  at  that  time 
While  on  the  perilous  ridge  I  hung  alone. 
With   what    strange   utterance    did    the    loud    dry    wind 
Blow  through  my  ear !  the  sky  seemed  not  a  sky 
Of  earth — and    with   what   motion   moved   the   clouds ! 

Far  from  overlooking  the  physical  boy  and  his  natural  ac- 
tivities, the  poet  is  nevertheless  absorbed  in  an  effort  to 
catch  fleeting  glimpses  of  a  growing  boy's  soul  life.  This 
he  accomplishes  by  analysing  his  own  early  experiences  in 
fields  and  woods,  where  nature  taught  him  in  boyhood  with 
inscrutable  workmanship  those  elements  that  are  a  needful 
part  of  the  calm  moments  he  enjoys  when  worthy  of  him- 
self. 

Praise  to  the  end ! 
Thanks  to  the  means  which  nature  deigned  to  employ; 
Whether  her  fearless  visitings,  or  those 
That  came  with  soft  alarm,  like  hurtless  light 
Opening  the  peaceful  clouds;  or  she  may  use 
Severer  interventions,  ministry 
More  palpable,  as  best  might  suit  her  aim. 

This  deeper  insight  is  revealed,  again,  in  his  notice  of 
another  phase  of  the  growing  boy's  activities.  Words- 
worth extended  interest  in  outdoor  play  to  include  the 
child's  delight  in  boating.  Hand  in  hand  with  this  ex- 
tension of  boundaries  there  will  be  noted  a  difference  of 
treatment.     There   is   a   vast   difference   between   the   early 


THE    GROWING    BOY  75 

poet's  brief  generalization  and  almost  bare  enumera- 
tion, ^  and  the  more  leisurely  lines  of  Wordsworth  which 
retard  the  action  in  order  to  linger  affectionately  over  de- 
tails. Wordsworth's  forerunners — for  especially  Bruce, 
Lovibond,  Scott,  and  Beattie  were  his  poetic  forbears  in 
their  ability  to  feel  if  not  fully  to  express  recollection  of 
childish  play — had  not  learned  the  art  of  poetically  fusing 
natural  phenomena,  to  which  they  sensitively  reacted,  with  a 
natural  philosophy  of  which  they  were  only  dimly  conscious. 
Wordsworth's  narrative  of  the  boat  ride  in  The  Excursion 
incorporates  details  of  preparation  in  the  vicar's  cottage, 
the  walk  down  the  stream  bed  to  the  lake,  the  arrival  of  the 
two  boys,  the  row  to  the  island,  the  picnic,  and  the  return. 
The  bare  details  necessary  for  a  visualization  of  the  outing 
would  not  demand  half  of  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  blank 
verse  lines  Wordsworth  devoted  to  his  description.  The 
essential  difference  between  the  earlier  poets  and  later  master 
does  not  lie  merely  in  the  addition  of  such  details  as  skim- 
ming stones  and  awakening  the  echoes,  or  gathering  water 
lilies,  details  which  in  themselves  enrich  the  development  of 
the  theme.  He  has  interwoven  comments  that  reveal  his 
deep  insight  into  the  significance  of  the  minutest  facts  of 
observation.  His  method  is  discursive,  but  unity  and 
harmony  are  achieved  through  the  sympathetic  observation 
of  a  seer  who  looks  upon  all  manifestations  of  life  with  a 
high  and  clearly  formulated  philosophy  that  enhances  the 
depth  and  beauty  of  external  nature.  He  is  not  feeling  his 
way  dimly,  but  is  working  with  conscious  art.  so  that  he 
may,  instead  of  announcing  his  mood  and  then  illustrating 
it  enumeratively,  fuse  the  mood  and  the  external  fact  with 
an  art  that  awakens  in  his  reader  a  feeling  for  the  unity  of 
spirit  and  matter  as  manifested  in  the  individual  experience. 

1  Compare  Thomas  Warton's  The  Hamlet. 


76  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Islands  in  Lake  Windermere  were  on  many  occasions 
the  goal  of  boat  races  and  boating  excursions.  His  effective 
lines  image  the  youthful  rowers  and  their  sweeping  oars, 
^ut  his  interest  is  not  in  the  race  so  much  as  in  the  lesson 
(which  the  quiet  retreat  on  the  island  taught  of  the  self- 
vsufficing  power  of  solitude.  In  the  evening  when  the  boys 
lay  in  their  boats  while  a  comrade  on  the  island  played  on 
a  flute,  the  young  Wordsworth's  sympathies  were  enlarged, 
and  the  ''common  range  of  visible  things"  grew  dearer  to 
him. 

He  not  only  throws  about  common  experience  a  halo  of 
imagination,  but  succeeds  in  associating,  and  often  fusing, 
the  experience  with  the  powers  of  the  universe.  In  such 
treatment  children  no  longer  stand  apart,  but  are  merged 
with  the  eternal  flux  of  life  as  revealed  in  nature.  Words- 
worth is  not  satisfied  to  rest  in  the  observation  of  phenomena, 
but  goes  on  to  interpret  their  significance  for  the  child. 

HI 
The  growing  tendency  to  look  back  with  affection  on 
early  associations  is  revealed  most  fully  in  connection  with 
the  change  that  took  place  in  the  eighteenth  century  from 
the  rationalistic  to  the  sentimental  point  of  view.  While 
the  worship  of  reason  was  reaching  its  height  in  the  en- 
cyclopedists and  the  academic  war  of  pamphlets  over  a  sub- 
ject like  deism,  a  new  poetic  method  slowly  gained  a  foot- 
hold by  emphasizing  the  trustworthiness  of  impulses  from 
the  heart.  Reason,  it  was  beginning  to  be  felt,  had  failed 
to  provide  an  adequate  solution  for  the  momentous  prob- 
lems of  religion  and  philosophy,  and  poets  were  increasingly 
willing  to  turn  elsewhere  for  an  answer  to  their  question- 
ings.^    Their  willingness  to  trust  emotions  had  its  eft'ect  on 

1  An  Essay  on  the  Universe   (1739)   by  Moses  Browne: 
Who  scorn  the  Modish  Sceptic's  scoffing  Chair, 
Faultless  in  Manners,  in  Opinion  clear. 


THE   GROWING    BOY  l^ 

poetic  treatment  of  childhood.  The  emotional  interpreta- 
tion of  life  irresistibly  led  poets  to  a  contemplation  of  their 
childhood  days  in  such  a  mood  as  that  of  Gray,  whose  lines 
enshrine  the  countryside  near  Eton  and  Stoke  Pogis : 

Ah.  happy  hills,  ah,  pleasing  shade, 

Ah,   fields   beloved   in   vain, 
Where    once    my    careless    childhood    strayed, 

A  stranger  yet  to  pain. 
I  feel  the  gales,  that  from  ye  blow, 
A  momentary  bliss  bestow. 

This  tendency  is  especially  strong  in  those  transition  poets 
who  were  born  in  remote  villages  and  country  places  where 
they  had  tasted  the  sweets  of  solitude  and  come  in  contact 
with  the  life  of  woods  and  fields.  ^     There  they  had  vaguely 

1  Although  one  must  always  except  Charles  Lamb's  affection 
for  London,  it  is  significant  that  the  affection  for  native  fields  did  not 
flourish  in  city  or  village  surroundings.  Scott  recalls  how  rural 
Amwell  stirred  him  to  poetry  in  early  youth;  but  even  he,  whose 
name  has  become  attached  to  that  of  the  hamlet,  sings  of  "lovely 
sylvan  scenes."  Burns  is  not  thinking  of  the  village  when  he  refers 
incidentally  but  feelingly  to  Ayr,  "my  dear,  my  native  ground." 
Fitzgerald,  obviously  writing  in  imitation  of  Goldsmith,  would  dwell 
upon  the  charms  of  his  native  village,  but  like  Scott  notices  chiefly 
surrounding  farms  and  "verdant  hills."  There  is  humor  too  in  his 
inability  to  weave  the  name  of  his  beloved  Tipperary  into  verse 
(The  Academic  Sportsman)  : 

And  thee,  dear  village!  loveliest  of  the  clime, 
(Fain  would  I  name  thee,  but  I  can't  in  rhyme) 
Where    first    my   years    in    youthful    pleasures    passed. 
Crabbe's  native  Aldborough  has  come  off  badly  in  the  lines  which 
image  its  hideous  squalor.     Bristol  was  doubly  unfortunate  as   re- 
membered by  Chatterton  and   Lovell.     They  speak  of  their  native 
city  in  terms  of  vituperation.     Chatterton's  Last  Verses  are  bitter: 
Farewell,  Bristolia's  dingy  piles  of  brick, 
Lovers  of  Mammon,  worshippers  of  Trick, 
Ye    spurned    the   boy    who   gave    you    antique    lays. 
Lovell's   Bristol   apostrophizes    Chatterton   as   the    ill-starred   youth 


78  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

felt  Spiritual  ministrations  which  constitute  the  determining 
factor  in  Wordsworth's  recollections  of  childhood  play. 

The  attention  of  early  poets  to  the  native  fields  motive 
prepared  the  way  for  Wordsworth's  conception  in  The  Pre- 
lude and  Ode.  Recollection,  therefore,  must  be  associated 
with  agreeable  sensations,  for  in  the  romantic  development 
the  tendency  is  to  purify  and  exalt  childhood.  Unpleasant 
associations  have  a  negative  influence  that  is  out  of  harmony 
with  the  poet's  chief  intention.  ^  This  excludes,  for  in- 
stance, the  sentiment  that  departure  or  banishment  from 
native  fields  is  a  misfortune.  -     A  favorite  device  is  to  pic- 

who  was  luckless  to  have  been  born  in  a  city  where  no  one  fostered 

wortli.     He  writes  of  Bristol: 

The  widows  mourn,  the  fatherless  complain, 
But  (shame  to  Bristol!)   still  they  call  in  vain. 

1  In  Johnson's  penance  for  a  boyish  act  of  disobedience  one  feels 
the  genuine  heart-^beats  of  the  pious  doctor.  "Once,  indeed,  I  was 
disobedient;  I  refused  to  attend  my  father  to  Uttoxeter  market. 
Pride  was  the  source  of  that  refusal,  and  the  remembrance  of  it  was 
painful.  A  few  years  ago,  I  desired  to  atone  for  this  fault.  I  went 
to  Uttoxeter  in  very  bad  weather,  and  stood  for  a  considerable  time 
bareheaded  in  the  rain,  on  the  spot  where  my  father's  stall  used  to 
stand.     In  contrition  I  stood,  and  I  hope  the  penance  was  expiatory." 

2  Logan's  The  Lovers  pictures  Harriet,  who  is  about  to  flee 
with  Henry,  weeping  sentimentally  over  her  departure  from  the 
castle  in  which  she  was  born.  Bruce's  Lochleven  No  More  is  con- 
ceived in  a  mood  that  emphasizes  equally  the  pains  of  separation 
from  native  fields  and  from  his  boyish  love  Peggy.  The  legal  au- 
thority William  Blackstone  pictures  the  man  condemned  to  exile 
as  turning  about  on  an  eminence  that  will  shut  him  off  from  home. 
(A  Lawyer's  Farewell  to  his  Muse): 

There,    melting    at    the    well-known    view, 

Drops  a  last  tear,  and  bids  adieu. 
In  an  Elegy,  Daniel  Hayes  vaguely  connects  the  sentiment  with  in-' 
herited  misfortunes  when  he  depicts  the  longing  of  the  man  who 
feels  that  he  is  probably  expiating  an  impious  act  which  was  com- 


THE    GROWING    BOY  79 

ture  the  nostalgia  of  the  sea-roving  sailor.  In  Syr  Martyn, 
Mickle  incidentally  notices  a  sea  rover  who  had  toiled  on 
the  seven  seas  for  ten  long  years,  cheered  by  the  hope  of 
revisiting  his  native  soil.  Arrived  at  his  childhood  home, 
he  wandered  over  the  meadow  and  in  the  shade  of  the  elms 
by  the  streamlet,  where  he  listened  to  the  cawing  rooks. 
Mickle  enters  into  the  spirit  of  the  wanderer  and  makes  a 
genuine  effort  to  express  the  sentiment  that  prompts  recol- 
lection of  childhood  haunts. 

In  lines  Composed  by  the  Sea-Shore,  Wordsworth  ana- 
lyzes the  common  human  emotions  that  lead  to  a  desire 
for  the  happiness  of  obscurity.  The  specifically  romantic 
attitude  toward  native  fields  sprang  from  this  longing  for 
quiet  after  the  labors  and  disappointments  of  life.  Words- 
worth holds  that  where  realization  of  the  dream  is  possible 
to  men  in  many  ordinary  walks  of  life,  the  sailor  is  com- 
pelled to  rest  in  the  world  of  memory.  On  the  restless  sea 
the  sailor,  more  than  men  elsewhere,  knows  how 

sad  it  is,  in  sight  of  foreign  shores, 
Daily  to  think  on  old  familiar  doors, 
Hearths   loved    in   childhood,   and   ancestral    floors. 

It  was  common  even  in  the  classicist  tradition  to  take 
notice  of  the  normal  human  trait  that  leads  men  to  think 

mitted  perhaps  by  an  ancestor,  and  which  has  brought  upon  him 
the  curse  of  separation  from  friends  in  native  fields.  In  a  poem  at- 
tributed to  Burns,  the  Elegy  on  "Stella"  (1787),  the  subject  of  which 
is  supposed  to  be  Mary  Campbell,  whose  grave  he  visited  in  the 
kirkyard  in  the  West  Highlands,  Burns's  rising  tears  flow  for  the 
unhappy  Stella  who  was  stricken  far  from  her  loved  friends. — 
Compare  lines  from  one  of  Shenstone's  Songs: 

Not    more,    the    schoolboy    that    expires 

Far  from  his  native  home,  requires 

To  see  some  friend's  familiar  face. 

Or  meet  a  parent's  last  embrace. 
Compare  also  Elinor  (1799),  one  of  Southey's  Botany-Bay  Eclogues. 


80  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

back  affectionately  to  their  childhood  days.  But  the  clas- 
sicists and  their  followers  did  not  attach  to  the  recollection 
any  such  mood  as  that  of  the  romanticists.  They  may  note 
how  in  manhood  it  is  human  to  look  with  dear  regard  on 
childhood.  But  their  observation  refers  merely  to  the  com- 
monplace experience  which  Somerville  expressed  in  his  pre- 
face to  The  Chase:  "The  old  and  infirm  have  at  least  this 
privilege,  that  they  can  recall  to  their  minds  those  scenes  of 
joy  in  which  they  once  delighted.  .  .  .  The  amusements 
of  our  youth  are  the  boast  and  comfort  of  our  declining 
years." 

In  Birth-Day  Verses  on  Mr.  Ford,  Swift  voiced  the  pre- 
romantic  attitude  toward  locality  with  reference  to  affection 
for  native  fields. 

She  bid  me,  with  a  serious  face, 
Be  sure  conceal  the  time  and  place; 
And  not  my  compliment  to  spoil, 
By  calling  this  your  native  soil. 

Later  he  addresses  Mr.  Ford. 

Can  you   on  Dublin  look  with   scorn; 
Yet  here  were  you  and  Ormond  born. 

The  following  lines  make  clear  the  lack  of  sympathy  which 
the  classicists  felt  with  what  by  the  end  of  the  century  had 
become  a  commonplace  in  Romanticist  verse. 

Oh !  were  but  you  and  I  so  wise 

To  see  with  Robert  Grattan's  eyes. 

Robin  adores  that  spot  of  earth, 

That    literal    spot,    which    gave    him    birth, 

And  swears  Belcamp  is,  to  his  taste, 

As  fine  as  Hampton  Court  at  least. 

When  to  your  friends  you  would  enhance 

The  praise  of  Italy  or  France, 

For  grandeur,  elegance,  or  wit. 

We  gladly  hear  you,  and  submit: 


THE    GROWING    BOY  81 

But  then,  to  come  and  keep  a  clutter 
For  this  or  that  side  of  the  grutter. 
To  live  in  this  or  the'  other  isle, 
We  cannot  think  it  worth  your  while; 
For,  take  it  kindly  or  amiss. 
The  difference  but  amounts  to  this, 
We  bury  on  our  side  the  Channel 
In  linen,  and  you  your's  in  flannel.  ^ 

The  essentially  new  element  is  the  romantic  emotion  which 
was  awakened  by  recollection  of  specific  localities.  This 
is  extended  so  that  companions  of  childhood  are  remembered 
in  connection  with  native  fields.  Lifelong  friendship  is  en- 
riched by  recollection  of  childhood  play.  In  Cowper's  lines 
on  Edward  Thurlow,  the  promotion  of  his  friend  to  the 
Lord  High  Chancellorship  is  enhanced  by  the  recollection 
that  his  abilities  had  been  recognized  from  the  days  when 
he  was  a  fellow  apprentice.  Cowper's  To  Warren  Hastings 
is  attached,  in  the  speaking  title,  to  their  schoolboy  fellowship 
at  Westminster.  Cowper  can  not  believe  the  accusations 
brought  against  his  schoolmate,  whom  he  had  known  when 
young  to  possess  those  gentle  qualities  which  could  not 
have  made  him  ''the  worst  of  men." 

In  Coming  to  the  Country,  Graeme  identifies  early  friend- 
ship with  native  fields  in  a  mood  of  personal  reminiscence. 

1  Contrast  On  Revisiting  the  Place  of  my  Nativity  (1800),  in 
which  Robert  Bloomfield  tells  how.  after  he  had  sighed  for  "Twelve 
successive  Summers,"  he  "heard  the  language  of  enchanting 
Spring," 

"Come    to    thy    native    groves    and    fruitful    fields. 
* 

I've  clothed  them  all;  the  very  Woods  where  thou 
In    infancy    learn'dst    praise    from    every    bough." 
"Remoter  bliss"  no  longer  glows  in  his  bosom, 

for  I  have  heard  and  seen 
The  long-remembered  voice,  the  church,  the  green. 


82  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Hail,   dear   companions   of   my  youthful   days ! 
Frequented  hills  and  natal  valleys,  hail ! 

The  romantic  emphasis  is  clear  also  in  the  mood  and  rhythm 
of  Bruce's  apostrophe  to  his  friend  Mr,  George  Anderson  in 
Lochleven.  He  definitely  associates  their  friendship  with 
the  district  of  Lochleven. 

Nor    shall    the    Muse    forget    thy    friendly    heart, 

O  Lelius !  partner  of  my  youthful  hours ; 

How  often,  rising  from  the  bed  of  peace. 

We  would  walk  forth  to  meet  the  summer  morn, 

Inhaling  health  and  harmony  of  mind; 

Philosophers  and  friends ;  while  science  beamed 

With  ray  divine  as  lovely  on  our  minds 

As  yonder  orient  sun,  whose  welcome  light 

Revealed  the  vernal  landscape  to  the  view. 

Yet  oft,  unbending  from  more  serious  thought, 

Much  of  the  looser  follies  of  mankind, 

Hum'rous  and  gay,  we'd  talk,  and  much  would  laugh ; 

While,  ever  and  anon,  their  foibles  vain. 

Imagination  offered  to  our  view. 

Jago's  attachment  to  Shenstone  w^as  enhanced  by  the 
thought  of  their  having  been  associated  in  youthful  toil  at 
Solihul,  where  Shenstone  had  called  Jago  with  friendly  voice 
from  giddy  sports  to  follow  him  ''intent  on  better  themes." 
In  Edge  Hill,  Jago  recalls  their  congenial  pursuits 

On  Cherwell's  banks,  by  kindred  science  nursed. 

Southey  unbends  as  far  as  his  temperament  allows  him, 
in  the  lines  To  Margaret  Hill  (1798),  when  he  recalls  de- 
lightful companionship  with  his  cousin  in  childhood. 
Though  he  has  not  seen  her  for  many  years,  he  owes  her  a 
debt  of  kindness. 

For  you  and  I 
Grew  up  together,  and,  when  we  look  back 
Upon   old  times,   our   recollections   paint 
The  same  familiar  faces. 


THE   GROWING    BOY  83 

If  he  had  the  power  of  MerHn  he  would  "make  brave  witch- 
craft" and  carry  her  back  with  him  to  the  play  hours  of  their 
carefree  childhood  when  they  played  with  a  Noah's  ark, 
read  in  "Pilgrim's  Progress,"  or  lived  free  as  on  an  island 
where  no  mariner  might  disturb  them. 

In  such  a  blessed   isle 
We  might  renew  the  days  of  infancy, 
And  life,  like  a  long  childhood,  pass  away 
Without  one  care. 

The  association  of  life-long  friendship  and  native  fields 
finds  its  classical  statement  in  Atild  Lang  Syne.  iThe  frank 
human  loyalty  of  a  friendship  that  has  stood  the  severe  tests 
of  separation  in  time  and  place  has  nowhere  else  in  English 
literature  found  such  unaffected  expression.  The  warm- 
hearted peasant  poet,  who  was  human  and  a  good  com- 
panion always,  felt  the  emotion  in  its  purity,  and  expressed 
it  without  embellishment  or  adornment  in  the  simple  rhythm 
of  folk  song.  Every  line  has  the  air  of  finality  and  univer- 
sality characteristic  of  a  classic.  Its  place  is  secure  in  the 
ritual  of  friendship. 

We  twa  hae  run  about  the  braes, 

And  pou'd  the  gowans  fine ; 
But  we've  wandered  many  a  weary  fitt, 

Sin'  auld  lang  syne. 

We  twa  hae  paidl'd   in  the  burn, 

Frae  morning  sun  till  dine; 
But  seas  between  us  braid  hae  roared 

Sin'  auld  lang  syne. 

Wordsworth  emphasizes  the  personal  element.  Dorothy 
is  dearer  to  Wordsworth  because  of  their  companionship 
when  she  was  "A  little  Prattler  among  men."  He  gives  ex- 
pression to  this  mood  in  his  tribute  to  Dorothy  in  The  Spar- 
rcmfs  Nest  (1801),  when  he  recalls 


84  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

The  Sparrow's  dwelling,  which,  hard  by 
My  Father's  house,  in  wet  or  dry 
My  sister  Emmeline  and  I 
Together  visited. 

* 

The  Blessing  of  my  later  years 
Was  with  me  when  a  boy. 

Fate,  however,  has  not  always  allowed  the  poet  to  take 
a  "cup  o'  kindness"  with  his  Hfe-long  friend.  The  poet 
must  often  in  later  years  mourn  the  loss  of  his  childhood 
friend.  In  his  monody  on  the  death  of  William  Arnot 
(Daphnis:  A  Monody),  Bruce  regrets  that  the  promise  of 
youthful  friendship  as  revealed  in  their  early  companion- 
ship has  not  been  fulfilled. 

Oft  by  the  side  of  Leven's  crystal  Lake, 

Trembling  beneath  the  closing  lids  of  light, 

With    slow    short-measured    steps    we    took    our    walk. 

* 

O,  happy  days! — for  ever,  ever  gone! 

When  o'er  the  flowery  green  we  ran,  we  played 

With  blooms  bedropped  by  youthful   Summer's   hand; 

Or,  in  the  willow's  shade, 

We  mimic  castles  built  among  the  sand, 

Soon  by  the  sounding  surge  to  be  beat  down. 

In  tracing  the  emergence  of  the  childhood  theme  it  is 
fascinating  to  note  how  transition  poets  grafted  tender 
shoots  of  thought  and  emotion  on  the  classicist  stock.  At 
times  the  classicist  element  predominates,  especially  in  the 
poet's  inability  to  create  a  new  vocabulary  that  will  ade- 
quately express  his  novel  emotions,  with  the  result  that  he 
must  have  recourse  to  stock  poetic  diction;  or,  as  in  the 
twilight  musings  of  the  sensitive  Collins,  divinations  of  the 
introspective  attitude  are  daintily  shadowed  forth  in  a  deli- 
cate lacework  of  classical  allusions.  Bruce's  To  a  Foimtain 
is  especially  interesting  in  its  indications  of  the  slow  pro- 


THE    GROWING    BOY  8d 

cess  of  separation  that  took  place  between  traditional  and 
new  poetic  material.  Briice's  poem  shows  him  to  be  a 
transition  poet  in  whom  the  combined  backward  look  and 
romantic  vision  lead  almost  to  a  confusion  of  treatment. 
The  opening  stanzas  indicate  that  he  was  prompted  by  affec- 
tion for  native  fields ;  yet  he  could  not  break  away  from 
expression  of  conventional  pastoral  love  for  his  Anna,  his 
play  companion,  who  is  addressed  as  "Young  Naiad  of  the 
vale." 

Then  in  simple  language  that  suggests  the  later  roman- 
ticists, Bruce  gives  a  clear  statement  of  recollection  of  his 
happy  childhood,  together  with  a  more  conventional  glimpse 
of  the  age  of  innocence. 

Fount  of  my  native  wood !  thy  murmurs  greet 
My  ear,  like  poet's  heavenly  strain : 
Fancy  pictures  in  a  dream 
The  golden  days  of  youth. 

O  state  of  innocence  !     O  paradise  ! 
In  Hope's  gay  garden,  Fancy  views 
Golden  blossoms,  golden  fruits, 
And  Eden  ever  green. 

This  suggests  still  another  motive  of  special  interest  here — 
that  of  friendship: 

Where    now,    ye    dear    companions    of    my    youth ! 
Ye  brothers  of  my  bosom !   where 
Do  ye  tread  the  walks  of  life, 
Wide  scattered  o'er  the  world? 

In  the  midst  of  the  closing  stanzas,  which  show  a  tendency 
toward  eighteenth-century  moralizing,  he  gives  expression 
to  the  consolation  that  comes  from  romantic  contemplation 
of  external  nature  mingled  with  the  gleam  that  the  poet's 
imagination  brings  to  nature. 


86  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

But  Hope's  fair  visions,  and  the  beams  of  Joy, 
Shall  cheer  my  bosom:   I  will  sing 
Nature's  beauty,  Nature's  birth. 

In  the  face  of  his  loss  he  will  be  inspired  by  visions  that 
are  fair  as  the  landscapes  of  heavenly  bliss.  If  his  diction 
and  poetic  method  reveal  dependence  on  tradition,  the 
forward  look  is  nevertheless  unmistakable  in  the  predomi- 
nant mood,  which  emphasizes  recollection  of  locality  in  con- 
nection with  childhood,  and  which  is  expressed  with  a  high 
seriousness  that  involves  suggestions  of  nature  worship  set 
forth  in  the  language  of  religion. 

Mickle's  elegy  on  his  brother  (Pollio,  1762)  was  sug- 
gested when  the  poet  revisited  the  woods  and  streams  of 
their  childhood  play.  His  heart  is  charged  with  grief  at 
sight  of  familiar  scenes. 

Oft  with  the  rising  sun,  when  life  was  new, 

Along  the  woodland  have  I  roamed  with  thee; 

Oft  by  the  moon  have  brushed  the  evening  dew, 
When  all  was  fearless  innocence  and  glee. 

The   sainted    well,    where   yon   bleak   hill    declines, 
Has  oft  been  conscious  of  those  happy  hours ; 

But  now  the  hill,  the  river  crowned  with  pines, 

And  sainted  well,  have  lost  their  cheering  powers : 

For  thou  art  gone — My  guide,  my  friend,  oh !  where. 
Where  hast  thou  fled,  and  left  me  here  behind? 

My  tenderest  wish,  my  heart  to  thee  was  bare, 
Oh,  now  cut  off  each  passage  to  thy  m'nd. 

It  would  be  unjust  to  Mickle  to  compare  his  lines  with  Ten- 
nyson's on  Arthur  Hallam,  yet  he  gives  simple  expression 
to  a  deep  sense  of  irreparable  loss,  in  lines  that  turn  to 
familiar  scenes  with  an  appreciation  of  external  nature  as  a 
witness  to  the  friendship  that  has  been  severed  by  death. 


THE    GROWING    BOY  87 

From  the  time  of  Bruce  to  the  nineties,  the  taste  for  auto- 
biographical reminiscence  grew  steadily.  ^  Logan's  In 
Autumn  expresses  the  poet's  sense  of  loss  upon  visiting 
''well  known  streams,"  "wonted  groves,"  and  "hospitable 
hall." 

My  steps,  when  innocent  and  young, 

These  fairy  paths  pursued ; 
And,  wandering  o'er  the  wild,  I  sung 

My  fancies  to  the  wood. 

As  a  child  he  wept  tenderly  over  "imaged  woes,"  little  know- 
ing that  "real  life"  was  itself  a  "tragic  tale."  As  he 
wanders  among  familiar  scenes  he  hears  no  voice  hailing 
"A  stranger  to  his  native  bowers." 

Companions  of  the  youthful   scene, 

Endeared  from  earliest  days ! 
With  whom  I  sported  on  the  green, 

Or  roved  the  woodland  maze ! 
Long-exiled  from  your  native  clime. 
Or  by  the  thunder-stroke  of  Time 

Snatched  to  the  shadows  of  despair ; 
I  hear  your  voices  in  the  wind, 

Your  forms  in  every  walk  I  find, 
I  stretch  my  arms :  ye  vanish  into  air ! 

In  an  early  poem,  The  Retrospect  (1796),  Southey  ex- 
presses the  utter  loneliness  of  the  mature  man  in  scenes 
which  were  familiar  in  childhood,  and  among  which  he  had 
hoped  to  realize  again  the  pleasure  and  friendship  of  school- 
days.    Memory's  "busy  eye"  had  often  reconstructed 

Each  little  vestige  of  the  well-known  place ; 
Each  wonted  haunt  and  scene  of  youthful  joy, 
Where   merriment   had   cheered    the    careless    boy; 

1  Although  Wordsworth's  choice  of  subject  in  The  Prelude  may 
have  been  influenced  by  Rousseau's  Confessions,  it  is  not  necessary 
to  take  that  book  into  account  here,  as  the  native  development  in 
poetry  is  clearly  marked  before  the  appearance  of  the  Confessions. 


88  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Well  pleased  will  fancy  still  the  spot  survey 
Where  once  he  triumphed  in  the  boyish  play, 
Without  one  care  where  every  morn  he  rose, 
Where  every  evening  sunk  to  calm  repose. 

Upon  returning  to  familiar  scenes,  he  finds  that  he  is  a 
stranger : 

Where  whilom  all  were  friends  I  stand  alone, 
Unknowing  all  I  saw,  of  all  I  saw  unknown. 

On  My  Own  Miniature  Picture  Taken  at  Two  Years  of 
Age  (1796)  develops  the  backward  look  in  a  less  sombre 
vein.  As  he  contemplates  the  miniature,  Southey  is  re- 
minded of  the  changes  that  have  taken  place  in  himself  and 
his  friends.  Was  he  once  like  the  picture?  Were  the 
glowing  cheeks,  the  pleasure-sparkling  eyes,  and  the  smooth 
brow  really  his?     Years  have  wrought  a  strange  alteration. 

Of  the  friends 
Who  once  so  dearly  prized  this  miniature, 
And  loved  it  for  its  likeness,  some  are  gone 
To  their  last  home;  and  some,  estranged  in  heart, 
Beholding  me,  with  quick-averted  glance 
Pass  on  the  other  side. 

The  elegiac  strain  was  developed  by  Lamb  in  The  Old 
Familiar  Faces  (1798)  in  a  mood  of  restrospective  regret 
stimulated  by  poignant  grief  that  excluded  classicalities  and 
also  whimsical  lines  like  those  of  Thomas  Hood  in  ''I  re- 
member, I  remember."  Lamb  mourns  the  loss  of  more 
than  one  friend : 

I  have  had  playmates,  I  have  had  companions, 

In   my   days  of  childhood,   in   my  joyful   schooldays — 

All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 

He  loved  the  fairest  among  women,  but 

Closed  are  her  doors  on  me,  I  must  not  see  her. 


THE    GROWING    BOY  89 

Although  he  may  still  laiioh  and  carouse  with  his  bosom 
cronies,  he  must  continue  to  pace  ghost-like  the  haunts  of 
his  childhood,  and  think  of  his  friends  how 

Some  they  have  died,  and  some  they  have  left  me, 
And  some  are  taken  from  me;  all  are  departed; 
All,  all  are  gone,  the  old  familiar  faces. 

In  Wordsworth's  lines  on  his  school  companion  who 
"Blew  mimic  hootings  to  the  silent  owls,"  local  feeling  is 
stronger  than  that  of  severed  friendship.  ^ 

Swift,  who  was  willing  to  tolerate  praise  of  the  elegance 
and  wit  of  France  and  Italy,  would  have  had  scant  sym- 
pathy with  modern  sentimental  journeys  to  the  homes  of 
English  men  of  letters.  Yet  long  before  the  close  of  the 
century  Scott  of  Amwell's  interest  in  Collins  prompted 
a  journey  to  Chichester  to  find  the  grave  of  the  poet.  In 
the  year  of  Swift's  death,  Akenside  in  the  Ode  to  the  Muse 
recalls  his  early  days  when  the  muse  set  him  aglow  with 
prophetic  heat  which  he  no  longer  feels. 

Where  all  the  bright  mysterious  dreams 

Of  haunted  groves  and  tuneful  streams. 

That  woo'd  my  genius  to  divinest  themes? 

He  asks  for  a  free  poetic  hour  among  the  duties  which 
promise  him  fame  as  a  physician.  As  he  writes,  he  feels 
himself  again  possessed  by  the  spirit  of  ix)etry,  and  his 
lx)som  burns. 

Such    on    the    banks    of    Tyne.    confessed, 

I  hailed  the  fair  immortal  guest. 

When    first    she    sealed    me    for    her    own. 

In  less  than  a  year  after  Swift's  death,  Collins  published 
the  Ode  to  Pity  (1746),  in  which  he  sentimentally  notices 
the  birthplace  of  Otway  by  the  river  Arun.  In  this  poem 
Collins  has   in   fact  voiced   those  emotions  which,  in   their 

1  The  Prelude.  Book  HI. 


90  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

association  with  the  poet's  recollection  of  his  own  birth- 
place and  boyhood  days,  are  an  essential  element  in  the 
specifically  romantic  feeling  for  native  fields.  'Collins  im- 
plores Pity  to  receive  his  humble  strains  in  the  name  of 
Euripides,  who  composed  his  tragedies  by  the  side  of  distant 
Ilissus.  Then  he  wonders  why  he  should  find  it  necessary 
to  roam  in  fancy  by  the  side  of  that  deserted  stream : 
his  native  Arun  has  heard  the  plaints  of  a  poet. 

Wild  Arun,  too,  has  heard  thy  strains. 
And  echo,  'midst  my  native  plains. 
Been  soothed  by  pity's  lute. 

There  first  the  wren  thy  myrtles  shed 
On  gentlest  Otway's  infant  head, 

To  him  thy  cell  was  shown; 
And  while  he  sung  the  female  heart, 
With   youth's   soft  notes  unspoiled   by   art. 

Thy  turtles  mixed  their  own. 

The  susceptible  Lovibond  responded  to  this  motive  in 
Verses  zvritten  after  passing  through  Findon,  Sussex,  lydS. 
Findon  was  the  birthplace  of  his  teacher,  the  Rev.  Mr. 
Woodeson. 

Woodeson !   these  eyes  have   seen  thy  natal  earth, 
Thy  Findon,   sloping  from  the   southern   downs; 
Have  blessed  the  roof  ennobled  by  thy  birth. 

Emotional  recollection  of  the  poet's  birthplace  is  most 
frequently  attached  to  childhood  love  of  rivers  and  streams. 
The  transitional  poets  were  especially  susceptible  to  running 
water,  and  Wordsworth's  recollections  of  his  own  childhood 
are  indissolubly  associated  with  the  lakes  and  streams  of 
Lancashire  and  Westmoreland.  ^ 

1  Coleridge's  The  Brook  was  to  have  traced  one  of  the  Quan- 
tock  streams  from  its  source  to  its  mouth  in  the  Bristol  Channel. 
The  notes  and  maps  made  by  Coleridge  subjected  him  to  annoyance 
from  agents  of  the  British  government,  who  suspected  that  he  was 


THE   GROWING   BOY  91 

Thomas  Warton's  charming  sonnet  To  the  River  Lodon 
foreshadows  Wordsworth  in  that  Warton  reveals  attachment 
to  the  river  with  which  he  had  been  famihar  in  early  child- 
hood. He  recalls  the  banks  of  Lodon  as  fairy  ground ;  it 
was  there  that  his  muse  first  lisped.  In  his  memory  the 
stream  has  become  idealized  through  association  with  the 
pleasures  of  childhood ;  nowhere  has  he  found  skies  and  sun 
so  pure  as  near  his  sweet  native  stream.^  Langhorne  apos- 
trophizes the  Tweed  as  the  favored  stream  on  the  banks  of 
which  Thomson  gathered  flowers  in  childhood.  Although  the 
early  poets  did  not  amplify  their  recollection  to  the  extent  of 
Wordsworth  in  The  Prelude  and  other  poems  like  the  Dud- 
don  sonnets,  they  were  nevertheless  prone  to  recall  the 
first  exercise  of  the  poetic  faculty  in  connection  with  their 
rovings  in  the  meadows  or  woodlands  by  the  side  of  a 
stream.  Mason  takes  this  lead  so  frequently  that  the 
reader  tires  of  constant  reminders  of  his  wanderings  on  the 
banks  of  his  favorite  stream,  a  tributary  of  the  Humber. 

making  topographical  memoranda  of  military  value  to  the  French. 
(Is  there,  possibly,  a  connection  between  the  interest  in  childhood 
and  the  fondness  for  "sources"  and  "springs"  and  "fountains"?)  — 
Compare  also  Collins's  Ode  on  the  Popular  Superstitious: 

Ye  splendid  friths  and  lakes,  which,  far  away, 

Are    by    smooth    Annan    filled    or    pastoral    Tay, 

Or  Don's  romantic  springs,  at  distance  hail. 

Compare  also,  Samuel  Marsh  Oram's  To  the  River  Stour, 
"Where  Fielding  oft  musing  delighted  to  rove." 

1  J.  G.  Cooper  recalls  how  he  wandered  as  an  infant  by  Trent's 
"pellucid  streams."  On  his  sick-bed  Smollett  reverted  in  thought 
to  his  native  Leven-water : 

Pure   stream !    in    whose    transparent    wave 

My  youthful  limbs  I  wont  to  lave, 

No  torrents  stain  thy  limpid  source; 

No  rocks  impede  thy  dimpling  course, 

That  sweetly  warbles  o'er  its  bed. 


92  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

Langhorne  and  Bruce  reveal  special  fondness  for  native 
streams/  John  Langhorne  was  born  at  Kirkby  Stephen  in 
1735,  and  was  first  sent  to  a  school  at  Winton,  in  Westmore- 
land, and  later  to  one  at  Appleby,  until  the  age  of  eighteen. 
He  was  thus  brought  under  the  influence  of  the  same  na- 
tural scenery  as  Wordsworth.  In  the  closing  stanza  of  his 
lines  to  the  Genius  of  Westmorelcmd  he  dedicates,  while  in 
his  native  shades  retired,  his  votive  lay  to  the  spirit  which 
had  stimulated  his  youthful  endeavors,  and  from  which  he 
had  caught  the  sacred  fire.  It  was  none  other  than  the 
"hidden  power  of  these  wild  groves."  As  early  as  1759 
he  added  to  the  numerous  detached  poems  dedicated  to 
rivers,  his  address  To  the  River  Eden.  Though  thickly 
overlaid  with  ^Miction"  and  classicist  embellishments,  true 
feeling  is   suggested  in  the  opening  stanzas,  addressed  to 

Delightful    Edenl    parent   stream! 
In  a  pastoral  vein  he  mourns  lost  love  and  friendship,  but 
says  that 

'Tis  yet  some  joy  to  think  of  thee. 

He  too  had  strayed  pensively  along  the  "mazy  shore,"  and 
would  paint  those  scenes  again  where  he  had  played  with 
infant  joy.  Although  Langhorne  often  echoes  Thomson, 
he  could  be  as  definite  as  Wordsworth  in  recalling  specific 
locality. 

A  Fareivell  Hymn  to  the  Valley  of  Invan  indicates  the 
extent  to  which  Langhorne  had  freed  himself  from  classicist 
vocabulary.  Although  he  is  obviously  inspired  by  romantic 
emotions,  his  expression  is  not  always,  to  the  same  extent  as 
in  this  hymn,  characteristic  of  the  freer  vocabulary  of  later 
writers.     In  this  poem    (which  in   its  mood  may  be  con- 

1  Wordsworth  believed  that  Langhorne's  poetry  was  not  held 
in  as  high  esteem  as  it  should  be  (K.  Lienemann,  Die  Belesenheit 
von    William    Wordsworth.     Berlin,    1908,   p.  91). 


THE   GROWING    BOY  93 

sidered  to  suggest  Wordsworth's  farewell  to  his  native  re- 
gions) he  succeeds  in  phrasing  his  thought  without  classi- 
cal embellishment.  Like  Bruce  he  has  come  under  the 
influence  of  Collins  and  Gray  in  his  love  for  the  hour  of 
twilight,  which  was  favorable  to  sentimental  musings.  But 
at  the  same  time  he  also  provides  an  early  parallel  for 
Wordsworth's  loving  recollection  of  spots  endeared  to  him 
in  childhood.  His  musings  had  led  him  through  the  fields 
of  Irwan's  vale,  where  he  listened  to  the  song  of  the  black- 
bird. He  must  now  bewail  the  loss  of  these  pleasures. 
Like  Wordsworth,  although  without  his  power  of  expres- 
sion, he  will  prize  the  memory  of  his  experiences. 

Yet  still,  within  yon  vacant  grove, 

To  mark  the  close  of  parting  day; 
Along  yon  flow'ry  banks  to  rove, 

And  watch  the  wave  that  winds  away; 
Fair  Fancy  sure  shall  never  fail, 
Tho'  far  from  these,  and  Irwan's  vale ! 

Although  Bruce  sings  of  many  streams,  he  does  so  with 
special  delight  of  his  native  Gairney.  Michael  Bruce  was 
born  in  1746  in  a  little  hamlet  on  the  banks  of  Lochleven  in 
Kinrossshire.     In  Lochleven   (1766)    he  set  out  to  record 

the  dear  remembrance  of  his  native  fields 

before  a  slow  disease  carried  him  off  at  the  age  of  twenty- 
one  as  one  of  the  minor  inheritors  of  unfulfilled  renown. 
Like  other  transition  poets,  the  sensitive  Bruce  pointed  the 
way  for  the  early  and  late  romantic  poets  who  were  pre- 
occupied with  the  expression  of  their  love  of  external  na- 
ture. His  desire  was  to  make  immortal  the  rivers  of  his 
youth ;  they  shall  flow  "in  thy  poet's  lays."  Beauty  dwells 
ever-blooming  on  the  banks  of  Leven ;  and  he  first  tuned 
his  Doric  reed  on  the  banks  of  the  sweetly-winding  Gairney. 
His    twilight    musings    were    probably    stimulated    by    the 


94  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

"sweet-complaining"  Gray ;  and  his  debt  to  Thomson  is  clear 
in  his  lofty  conception  of  divine  joy  and  goodness  in  external 
nature.     He    recognizes    an    omnipresent    creator    who    is 

Ever  present  through  the  peopled  space 

Of  vast  Creation's  infinite  extent, 

Pours   life,   and  bliss,   and  beauty,   pours   Himself, 

His  own  essential  goodness,  o'er  the  minds 

Of  happy  beings,  thro'  ten  thousand  worlds. 

Bruce's  lines,  which  lead  into  his  address  to  his  childhood 
friend  Leliiis,  indicate  that  Wordsworth  was  the  crown  of  a 
development  that  linked  the  recollection  of  childhood  with 
the  infinite  goodness  and  powers  of  the  universe.  ^ 

Nearly  forty  years  before  The  Prelude,  Bruce  wrote  in 
Lochleven  an  autobiographical  poem  that  suggests  a  loving 
remembrance  of  childhood  days  among  beautiful  natural 
surroundings.  The  typical  descriptions  of  Thomson  have 
given  way  to  the  personal  point  of  view;  Bruce  has  defi- 
nitely connected  external  nature  with  the  individual  exper- 
ience. 

Still  as  I  mount,  the  less'ning  hills  decline. 

Till   high  above  them  northern   Grampius   lifts 

His  hoary  head,  bending  beneath  a  load 

Of  everlasting  snow.     O'er  southern  fields 

I  see  the  Cheviot  hills.   .    .    . 

But  chief  mine  eye  on  the  subjected  vale 

Of  Leven  pleased  looks  down. 

Although  Akenside's  Ode  to  the  Muse  (1745)  contains 
perhaps  the  earliest  extended  personal  recollection  of  native 
fields,  the  romantic  longing  to  be  again  a  child  does  not 
appear  in  the  earlier  form  of  his  Pleasures  of  the  Imagina- 

1  Wordsworth  possessed  Bruce's  poems  as  collected  by  Ander- 
son. Dorothy  read  Lochleven  in  1801.  Wordsworth  wished  to  see 
a  monument  erected  on  the  banks  of  Lochleven.  "to  the  memory  of 
the  innocent  and  tender-hearted  Michael  Bruce."  (Lienemann,  op. 
cit,  p.   165.) 


THE    GROWING    BOY  95 

Hon.  The  growth  of  sentiment  during  the  intervening  years 
is  reflected  in  the  revised  form  of  this  poem.  In  the 
uncompleted  fourth  book  of  the  revised  version  (1770), 
where  Akenside  set  himself  the  task  of  exploring  the  secret 
paths  of  early  genius,  he  wonders  where  youthful  poets 
now  invoke  the  muse,  and  associates  them  at  once  with 
rivers. 

What    wild    river's    brink    at    eve 

Imprint  your  steps? 

This  thought  stimulated  the  wish  that  he  might  again  as  in 
his  youth  be  with  them. 

— 'Would    I    again    were    with    you ! — O    ye    dales 
Of  Tyne,  and  ye  most  ancient  woodlands ;   where 
Oft  as  the  giant  flood  obliquely  strides, 
And  his  banks  open,  and  his  lawns  extend, 
Stops  short  the  pleased  traveler  to  view. 
* 

0  ye  Northumbrian  shades,  which  overlook 
The  rocky  pavement  and  the  mossy  falls 
Of  solitary  Wensbeck's  limpid  stream; 
How  gladly  I  recall  your  well-known  seats 
Beloved  of  old,  and  that  delightful  time 
When  all  alone,  for  many  a  summer's  day, 

1  wandered  through  your  calm  recesses,  led 
In  silence  by  some  powerful  hand  unseen ! 

In  the  poet's  notice  of  the  activities  of  the  growing  boy, 
there  is  a  change,  then,  from  generalized  recollection  to 
Akenside's  extended  treatment,  and  to  Southey's  well- 
defined  autobiographical  attitude  toward  early  childhood. 
In  Akenside's  apostrophe  to  the  Wensbeck  and  the  dales 
of  Tyne,  which  suggests  definitely  the  rhythm  and  mood  of 
Wordsworth,  there  is  no  longer  mere  juxtaposition  of  mood 
and  incident,  but  instead  a  fusion  of  both  elements.  The  way 
has  been  clearly  marked  for  Wordsworth's  mood  in  the 
poem  which  in  the  chronological  arrangement  of  his  poems 


96  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

appears  as  the  first.  It  is  the  conclusion  of  the  poem  he 
wrote  in  1786  in  anticipation  of  leaving  Hawkeshead  with 
the  vale  of  Esthwaite  and  his  native  regions.  In  these 
youthful  lines  he  clearly  foreshadows  the  mood  of  The  Pre- 
lude.    He  feels  with  fervid  emotion, 

That,  wheresoe'er  my  steps  may  tend, 
And  whensoe'er  my  course  shall  end, 
If  in  that  hour  a  single  tie 
Survive  of  local  sympathy, 
My  soul  will  cast  the  backward  view, 
The  longing  look  alone  on  you. 


CHAPTER  III 
CHILDREN    OF    THE    POOR 

The  extent  to  which  poets  had  prepared  the  way  for 
Wordsworth's  recollection  of  his  own  childhood  is  evident 
in  their  sentiment  for  native  fields.  Another  manifestation 
of  Wordsworth's  profound  interest  in  childhood  appears  in 
his  constructive  suggestions  for  ameliorating  the  condition 
of  the  children  of  the  poor.  The  influences  which  helped  to 
shape  his  views  are  felt  in  poetry  as  early  as  Thomson's 
Seasons. 

Constant  repetition  of  the  difference  between  the  man- 
made  city  and  the  God-given  beauty  of  the  country  reveals 
an  ethical  concept  of  increasing  power  in  eighteenth-cen- 
tury poetry.  In  the  contrast,  city  life  is  always  unfavorably 
depicted :  natural  man  has  no  opportunity  to  realize  himself 
under  artificial  conditions  of  city  life.  ^  This  attitude  can 
be  understood  in  the  light  of  philosophical  tendencies  that 
influenced  poets.  Hobbes  had  developed  a  philosophy  which 
asserted  that  man  is  by  nature  selfish,  and  that  compassion 
is  a  sign  of  weakness.  To  curb  this  selfishness  of  the  in- 
dividual he  had  advocated  a  strong  central  government. 
The  new  stimulus  felt  by  poets  with  whose  work  this  study 
is  concerned,  derived  not  from  the  egoistic  philosophy  of 
Hobbes  or  the  orthodox  teachings  of  the  church  on 
original  sin,  which  emphasized  the  imperfections  of  na- 
tural man,  but  from  the  philosophy  of  the  Earl  of  Shaftes- 

^  Compare  Thomson's  early  poem  Of  a  Country  Life,  begin- 
ning, 

I    hate    the    clamours    of    the    smoky    towns. 
See    also    Nathaniel    Cotton's    The   Fireside. 


98  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

bury,  who  asserted  the  doctrine  of  natural  goodness.^ 
Thomson's  harmony  of  all  created  beings  derives  from 
Shaftesbury's  identification  of  the  good  and  the  beautiful. 
In  this  conception  God,  who  is  held  to  be  sufficiently  re- 
vealed in  natural  phenomena,  is  the  embodiment  of  good- 
ness ;  he  is  the  spirit  of  love,  in  which  is  implied  benevolence 
towards  man,  whom  he  created  for  happiness.  Compassion, 
therefore,  is  not  a  weakness,  but  a  virtue ;  for  if  man  is  by 
nature  a  virtuous  being,  he  must  respect  his  fellow  man  and 
promote  his  happiness.  To  lack  compassion  is  to  be  out  of 
harmony  with  nature,  which  is  beautiful.  The  essence  of 
Shaftesbury's  philosophy  in  those  ethical  aspects  which  are 
especially  to  be  noted  in  the  poetry  with  which  the  following 
paragraphs  are  concerned,  is  that  the  benevolent  impulses 
of  natural  man  are  spontaneous  and  instinctive. 

To  Shaftesbury  may  be  traced  the  vigorous  interest  in 
philanthropy  which  animates  the  poetry  of  the  century.^ 
His  emphasis  on  the  social  affections  stimulated  poets.  Al- 
though it  has  been  said  that  Englishmen  were  deeply  inter- 
ested in  abolishing  negro  slave  traffic  at  the  very  time  when 
women  and,  especially,  children  were  condemned  to  indus- 
trial slavery,  it  must  be  remembered  that  those  poets  who 
used  benevolence  as  their  slogan  were  a  mighty  force  in  the 
awakening  of  social  consciousness,  the  results  of  which 
were  remedial  measures  and  legislation  by  which  children 
benefited.  Mandeville's  coarse  attack  on  Shaftesbury's 
Characteristics  had  emphasized  the  repulsive  features  of  the 
philosophy  of  Hobbes.  The  cynicism  of  the  pessimistic 
Mandeville  went  so  far  as  to  question  the  right  of  children 

1  Characteristics  of  Men,  Manners,  Opinions,   Times.      (1711). 

2  Shaftesbury  and  the  Ethical  Poets  in  England,  1700-1760, 
by  C.  A.  Moore.  Publications  of  the  Modern  Language  Asso- 
ciation of  America,   1916. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  99 

of  the  poor  to  what  httle  education  had  been  provided  for 
them  in  charity  schools  during-  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne. 
Poets  did  not  follow  Mandeville.  It  is  clear,  however,  that 
native  influences  determined  their  interest  in  benevolence 
before  Rousseau  added  his  strength  to  their  cause  after 
1760.  ^  In  fact,  even  before  the  middle  of  the  century, 
preoccupation  with  ethical  problems  amounts  almost  to 
a  convention.  The  readiness  with  which  poets  responded 
to  benevolence  is  to  be  explained,  furthermore,  on  the  basis 
of  social  conditions.  Luxury  had  been  on  the  increase 
even  before  1763,  when  England  definitely  took  its  place  as 
the  first  power  among-  nations.  The  industrial  revolution 
increased  poverty  and  unrest  among  the  masses.  A  new 
age  was  coming  into  being,  and  sensitive  poets  reflected  the 
pains  of  the  new  birth.  Their  sensibilities  were  aroused  by 
wrongs  which  they  saw  in  the  social  readjustment. 

The  extent  of  their  interest  in  universal  benevolence  is 
manifested  in  sympathetic  notice  of  orphans,  and  in  at- 
tacks on  luxury  and  deplorable  conditions  attributed  to  the 
rise  of  industry.  But  before  they  awakened  to  practical 
problems,  poets  had  been  sensitive  to  the  abuse  of  animals. 
In  fact,  before  1750,  poets  had  awakened  more  fully  to 
abuses  of  birds  and  animals  than  to  hardships  of  children  of 
the  poor.  It  will  be  necessary,  therefore,  to  note  first  of  all 
how  sympathy  for  children  was  closely  bound  up  with 
compassion  for  animals. 

1  Shaftesbury's  influence  continued  strong  up  to  the  time  of 
the  Revolution.  When,  however,  the  democratic  implications  of  his 
philosophy  became  obvious  in  the  audacious  presentation  of  Rousseau 
and  Paine,  and  in  the  events  of  the  Revolution  itself,  his  popularity 
at  once  declined.  Eleven  editions  of  the  Characteristics  appeared 
between  171 1  and  1790,  but  after  1790  no  new  edition  appeared  until 
1870.  (Characteristics,  edited  by  John  M.  Robertson,  2  vols.,  Lon- 
don, 1900.^ 


100  ENGLISH   CHILDHOOD 

I 

Thomson  and  those  who  Hke  him  exalted  rural  simplicity 
at  the  expense  of  city  manners,  found  congenial  matter  in 
animal  life.  Unlike  animals,  man  had  under  the  baneful 
influence  of  artificial  society  drifted  far  from  his  natural  self. 
His  instincts  had  become  dulled  to  such  an  extent  that,  for 
instance,  he  neglected  even  his  offspring  in  order  to  satisfy 
a  craving  for  luxury  and  pleasure.  He  prefers  smoky 
cities  and  palaces  to  sheltering  groves,  warm  caves,  and 
deep-sunk  valleys.  ^  God's  forests  stand  neglected  for  the 
comforts  of  civilization.  In  Fashion,  Joseph  Warton 
scorns  artificial  pleasures :  the  fashionable  woman  has  lost 
sight  of  natural  instincts.  Warton  would  lead  her  to  imi- 
tate the  loyalty  of  animals  to  their  young.  At  ten  in  the 
morning  the  fashionable  woman  drinks  chocolate  and  strokes 
Fop,  her  lap  dog ;  -  she  rises  at  noon,  and  after  an  elaborate 
toilette  dines  at  three. 

Meanwhile    her    babes    with    some    foul    nurse    remain; 

For  modern  dames  a  mother's  cares  disdain; 

Each  fortnight  once  she  bears  to  see  the  brats, 

Tor  oh !  they  stun  one's  ears  like  squalling  cats.' 

Tigers  and  pards  protect  and  nurse  their  young, 

The  parent  snake  will  roll  her  forked  tongue, 

The  vulture  hovers  vengeful  o'er  her  nest, 

If  the  rude  hand  her  helpless  brood  infest; 

Shall  lovely  woman,  softest  frame  of  heaven, 

To  whom  were  tears  and  feeling  pity  given, 

Most  fashionably  cruel,  less  regard 

Her  offspring  than  the  vulture,  snake,  and  pard? 

1  J.  Warton:  The  Enthusiast,  or  the  Lover  of  Nature   (1740)- 

2  Compare  Somerville's  The  Chase   (i735)  : 

the  rustic  dames 
Shall    at    thy    kennel    wait,    and    in    their    laps 
Receive   thy  growing  hopes,   with   many   a   kiss 
Caress,  and  dignify  their  little  charge 
With    some    great    title.   .    .    . 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  lOOR  101 

Isaac  Watts  distinguishes  between  children  who  are  sin- 
ful, and  animals  that  reflect  the  glory  of  God.  It  is  not  in 
itself  significant  that  the  emmet  and  bee  are  held  up  as 
models,  because  Watts's  purpose  is  didactic ;  but  plants  and 
animals  are  also  referred  to  as  containing  the  essence  of 
their  maker's  goodness,  which  children  are  taught  to  see 
in  nature.  Watts  can  see  beauty  and  goodness  everywhere 
except  in  the  heart  of  the  child,  between  whom  and  external 
nature  he  recognizes  a  breach.  In  Address  to  the  Deity  he 
is  unable  to  think  of  man  as  part  of  the  beauty  of  the  created 
universe ;  yet 

Beast  and  birds  with  laboring  throats 
Teach  us  a  God  in  thousand  notes. 

Watts  seems  in  fact  to  be  groping  for  a  religious  mood 
that  shall,  like  the  sentimental  contemplation  of  romantic 
poets,  mysteriously  reveal  God  through  the  heart.  Because 
of  the  inhibition  which  the  doctrine  of  natural  depravity  puts 
upon  him,  he  is  unable  to  complete  the  circle.  The  result 
is  a  cleavage  between  the  child  and  the  beauties  of  nature 
that  are  lauded  in  Praise  for  Creation  and  Providence 
(1720).  Against  Pride  in  Clothes  strikes  the  balance 
against  the  child,  whom  Watts  does  not  make  a  partaker  in 
the  goodness  and  beauty  of  nature.  The  child  is  made 
to  say, 

The  tulip  and  the  butterfly 

Appear  in  gayer  coats  than   I ; 

Let  me  be  dressed  fine  as  I  will, 

Flies,  worms,  and  flowers  exceed  me  still.  ^ 

Humanitarian  conceptions  find  no  place  in  Somer- 
ville's  The  Chase,  which  voices  the  traditional  sentiment  of 

^  Cp.  Cotton's  The  Beau  and  the   Viper: 
What  if  I  show  that  only  man 


Appears  defective  in  the  plan 


102  E^iGLISIi    CHILDHOOD 

country  gentlemen  who  believe  that  animals  were  created 
for  man,  and  that  he  is  their  mas-ter.^ 

Thomson,  on  the  other  hand,  disapproves  of  the  hunt  be- 
cause it  wantonly  interferes  with  the  happiness  to  which  all 
created  beings  are  entitled.  In  Winter  he  notices  the  hunter 
only  to  condemn  him.  Helpless  birds  merit  the  protection 
of  man.  When  the  spirit  of  universal  benevolence  is  mani- 
fest in  nature  in  early  spring,  birds  are  the  first  to  sing  of 
love.  Even  birds  whose  note  is  harsh  and  discordant  when 
heard  alone — like  the  jays,  rooks,  and  daws — merge  har- 
moniously into  the  chorus  of  song.  Thomson  lovingly 
names  over  the  list  of  romantic  birds,  and  in  terms  of  do- 
mestic life  describes  their  mating,  nesting,  and  raising  of 
the  young.  He  does  not  omit  to  focus  his  lines  on  the  self- 
sacrifice  of  parent  birds  who  unselfishly  bear  the  most  de- 
licious morsels  to  their  nestlings ;  and  he  brings  home  the 
humanitarian  thesis  in  the  closing  illustration  of  poverty- 
stricken  cottagers  who  check  their  appetites  to  give  their 
children  food.^ 

1  The  brute  creation  are  his  property, 

Subservient  to  his  will,  and  for  him  made: 
As  hurtful  these  he  kills,  as  useful  those 
Preserves;  their  sole  and  arbitrary  king. 

(The  Chase,  Book  IV) 

2  Yet  in  the  episode  of  the  starved  Pyrennean  wolves  that 
scour  the  countryside,  Thomson  recognizes  the  ferocity  of  animals 
bent  on  prey : 

Rapacious,  at  the  mother's  throat  they  fly. 
And    tear    the    screaming    infant    from    her    breast. 
Although  protesting  against  man's  cruelty,  later  poets  are  not  blind 
to  the  cruelty  of  nature.     In  Sensibility,  Burns  hears 
the  woodlark  charm  the  forest, 

Telling  o'er   his   little   joys; 
But  alas!  a  prey  the  surest 

To  each   pirate  of  the   skies.     (Continued) 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  103 

Smollett's  satire  bears  witness  to  widespread  sympathy 
for  animals.  Before  the  influence  of  Rousseau  had  been 
felt,  Smollett  had  burlesqued  Lyttleton's  Monody  (1747). 
His  Burlesque  Ode  failed,  however,  to  stem  the  ever  in- 
creasing tide  of  sentimental  tears.  To  ascribe  Shaw's 
Monody  (1768)  and  Ode  to  the  Nightingale  (1771)  wholly 
to  the  influence  of  Rousseau  is  to  ignore  the  persistent  na- 
tive influence  of  Shaftesbury  and  Thomson,  and  the  direct 
connection  which  Shaw  himself  establishes  between  his 
poems  and  the  Monody  of  Lyttleton.  ^ 

Lovibond  brings  native  benevolist  teachings  definitely 
into  connection  with  childhood.  In  Rural  Sports  he  casti- 
gates man  for  lack  of  feeling  towards  animals,  and  then 
points  to  children  who  lure  barnyard  fowl  only  to  feed  them. 
In  the  fresh  sunshine  of  early  morning  all  creation  swells 
the  chorus  of  delight  and  love.  Not  so  wnth  those  who 
wreak  havoc  by  cheering  the  baying  pack.  Lovibond  has 
visions  of  the  unity  of  man  and  animal  creation  ("For  con- 
cord, for  the  harmonious  whole")  that  was  to  stir  Coleridge 
and  Wordsworth.     He  is  not  content  to  rest  in  a  negative 

The  image  of  the  hawk  as  the  enemy  of  domestic  happiness 
is  used  again  in  Botiie  Jean  and  How  Cruel  are  the  Parents. 
Mason's  English  Garden  has  an  interesting  passage  that  shows  how 
the  hawk  preys  upon  the  mother  bird.  Mason  thinks  back  to  the 
golden  age  when  the  law  of  tooth  and  claw  did  not  prevail.  Scott 
faced  unpalatable  facts  in  Approach  of  Winter: 

Who  dreams  of  Nature,   free  from  Nature's   strife? 

Who  dreams  of  constant  happiness  below? 
The  hope-flushed  enterer  on  the  stage  of  life; 
The  youth  to  knowledge  unchastised  by  woe. 

1  Although  Henry  Brooke's  Universal  Beauty  (1735)  does  not 
notice  childhood,  Brooke's  appeal  for  universal  harmony,  and  his 
praise  of  insects,  together  with  moral  lessons  that  he  derives  from 
animal  life,  suggest  the  attitude  of  J.  Warton,  whose  comparison 
between  animals  and  man  is  unfavorable  to  man. 


104  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

attitude  of  condemnation,  but  asks  man  to  observe  the 
instinctive  humanity  of  children : 

beneath  thy  porch,  in  social  joy 
Sit    and    approve    thy    infant's    virtuous    haste, 
Humanity's  sweet  tones  while  all  employ 
To  lure  the  winged  domestics  to  repast. 

The  parent  should  learn  from  his  children  to  avoid  wan- 
ton killing  of  God's  creatures,  and  instead 

Let  Heaven's  best  joy  be  thine,  benevolence. 
The  closing  lines  foreshadow  the  moral  of  Coleridge's  stan- 
zas in  The  Ancient  Mariner,  in  which  the  later  poet  moral- 
izes the  experience  of  the  sailor  who  had  violated  the  law 
of  love  that  permeates  the  universe.  Lovibond  teaches  that 
it  is  God's  decree,  instinctively  obeyed  by  children, 

To   spare   thy   own,   nor   shed   another's   blood : 
Heaven  breathes  benevolence,  to  all,  to  thee; 
Each   being's   bliss   consummates   general    good. 

The  significance  of  Rural  Sports  lies  in  its  use  of  children 
to  represent  the  ideal  state  to  which  man  must  aspire  if  he 
wishes  to  live  according  to  the  laws  of  nature. 

Where  Lovibond  held  up  the  farmer's  children  as  an 
ideal  of  benevolence,  Beattie's  Minstrel  (1771)  definitely 
portrays  in  Edwin  an  individual  child  who  responds  to  the 
ideals  of  sentimental  humanitarianism. 

His  heart,  from  cruel  sport  estranged,  would  bleed 
To  work  the  woe  of  any  living  thing, 
By  trap,  or  net,  by  arrow  or  by  sling; 
These  he  detested ;  those  he  scorned  to  wield : 
He  wished  to  be  the  guardian,  not  the  king, 
Tyrant  far  less,  or  traitor  of  the  field ; 
And  sure  the  silvan  reign  unbloody  joy  might  yield. 

In  Beattie  the  change  from  Somerville's  conception  of  man 
as  the  sole  and  arbitrary  king  to  the  sentimental  view  of 
man  as  the  guardian,  indicates  the  difference  between  two 


CHILDREN  OF  THE   POOR  105 

outlooks  on  life.  In  the  poetic  treatment  of  children  it  in- 
dicates the  triumph  of  Shaftesbury's  teachings  of  universal 
benevolence.  ^ 

Burns,  Cowper,  and  Southey,  of  the  later  group  of  poets, 
were  alive  to  the  sufferings  of  animals.  In  his  lines  To  a 
Mouse,  Burns  talks  to  the  field  mouse  as  tenderly  as  he 
would  to  a  hurt  child,  and  mourns  over  the  fact  that  man 
has  broken  natural  ties.  In  The  Wounded  Hare  he  in- 
vokes a  curse  upon  the  man  who  hunts  hares  during  the 
breeding  season.  Among  the  passages  that  condemn  the 
hunter  of  wild  animals,  this  is  one  of  the  most  vigorous. 
Burns's  letter  to  Cunningham  reveals  the  sincerity  of  his 
indignation.-  He  develops  the  motive  in  terms  of  domestic 
Hfe: 

Perhaps  a  mother's  anguish  adds  its  woe ; 
The  playful  pair  crowd  fondly  by  thy  side; 
Ah !  helpless  nurslings,  who  will  now  provide 

That  life  a  mother  only  can  bestow ! 

1  Compare  Thomas  Blacklock,  one  of  the  chief  benevolists,  who 
banished  the  hunt  from  the  neighborhood  of  his  cottage,  and  wished 
to  trace  "Kind  Nature's  laws  with  sacred  Ashley."  Cp.  Bruce's 
Elegy   to  Spring: 

Thus  Ashley  gathered  Academic  bays; 

Thus  gentle  Thomson  as  the  Seasons  roll.  .    .    . 
But   contrast   the    boy    in    Robert    Bedingfield's    The   Education    of 
Achilles,    who    was    accustomed    "To    grasp    with    tender    hand    the 
pointed  spear." 

~  "One  morning  lately,  as  I  was  out  pretty  early  in  the  fields, 
sowing  some  grass-seeds,  I  heard  the  burst  of  a  shot  from  a 
neighboring  plantation,  and  presently  a  poor  little  wounded  hare 
came  crippling  by  me.  You  will  guess  my  indignation  at  the  in- 
human fellow  who  could  shoot  a  hare  at  this  season,  when  all  of 
them  have  young  ones.  Indeed,  there  is  something  in  this  business 
of  destroying,  for  our  sport,  individuals  in  the  animal  creation  that 
do  not  injure  us  materially,  which  I  could  never  reconcile  to  my  ideas 
of  virtue." 


106  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Cowper's  defense  of  animals  reflects  the  humanitarian 
implications  of  the  evangelical  revival.  He  pleads  for  the 
protection  of  bird  and  beast,  not  on  the  basis  of  natural  good- 
ness, but  because  he  is  prompted  by  Christian  sympathy  with 
the  helpless.  So  he  arrives  by  a  different  route  at  the  same 
goal  as  those  who  follow  Shaftesbury.  Cowper's  nature  is 
so  sensitive  to  abuse  of  animals,  that  he  observed  with  pain 
how  a  neighbor's  children  played  with  a  pet  leveret  about 
three  months  old.  As  they  understood  "better  how  to 
tease  the  poor  creature  than  to  feed  it,"  the  poet  received 
their  father's  consent  to  take  it  under  his  protection. 

The  humanitarian  thesis  was  uppermost  in  the  mind 
of  Southey,  even  when  he  expressed  his  personal  attach- 
ment to  the  dog  that  had  been  the  friend  of  his  childhood. 
In  the  lines  On  the  Death  of  a  Favorite  Old  Spaniel,  Southey 
lingers  over  recollections  of  childhood  days  spent  in  play 
with  *'poor  Phyllis."  He  writes  with  simple  tenderness  of 
his  personal  loss. 

thou  hadst  been 
Still  the   companion   of   my   boyish   sports; 
And,  as  I  roamed  o'er  Avon's  wooded  cliffs, 
From  many  a  day-dream  has  thy  short,  quick  bark 
Recalled   my   wandering   soul.     I    have   beguiled 
Often  the  melancholy  hours  at  school, 
Soured  by  some  little  tyrant,  with  the  thought 
Of  distant  home,  and  I  remembered  then 
Thy  faithful  fondness;  for  not  mean  the  joy, 
Returning  at  the  happy  holidays, 
I   felt  from  thy   dumb  welcome.  ^ 

When  the  gate  last  closed  upon  Southey  as  he  left  his  pater- 
nal roof,  Phyllis  lost  her  truest  friend,  and  no  one  was  left 
to  plead 

For  the  old  age  of  brute  fidelity. 

1  Compare    Thomson's    juvenile    poem    on    his    favorite    sister 
and  her  cat :  Lisy's  Parting  with  her  Cat. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  107 

The  closing  lines  of  this  early  poem  reveal  the  revolu- 
tionary and  antagonistic  Southey  who  had  not  yet  found 
himself  in  the  conservative  spirit  which  lay  at  the  root  of  his 
character  and  which  dominated  his  later  life.  His  plea  for 
animals  is  in  harmony  with  that  of  the  benevolists. 

Mine  is  no  narrow  creed; 
And    He    who   gave    thee    being   did    not    frame 
The  mystery  of  life  to  be  the  sport 
Of    merciless    Man.      There    is    another    world 
For  all  that  live  and  move, — a  better  one. 
Where  the  proud  bipeds,  who  would  fain  confine 
INFINITE   GOODNESS    to   the   little   bounds 
Of  their  own  charity,  may  envy  thee. 

Southey 's  heart,  to  use  his  own  words,  has  a  genuine  warmth, 
though  it  smokes  not;  his  feelings  are  not  mushroom  feel- 
ings that  spring  up  without  seed  and  take  no  root.  As  a 
result,  although  he  can  not  abandon  himself  to  the  spirit 
of  universal  benevolence  as  it  has  been  observed  in  the 
poets  who  preceded  him,  he  is  apparently  in  full  sympathy 
with  their  teachings.^ 

If  the  poet's  escape  from  city  to  country  seems  like 
a  weak  or  even  selfish  shrinking  from  responsibility,  it  must 
be  remembered  that  before  men  were  able  to  face  the  prob- 
lems of  practical  reform,  their  hearts  had  to  be  attuned  to 
the  sorrows  of  man  and,  especially,  of  animals,  the  sympa- 

^  Cp.  Day's  Sandford  and  Mertoiin:  "I  believe,  as  I  have  before 
told  you,  there  is  no  animal  that  may  not  be  rendered  mild  and  in- 
offensive by  good  usage."  (I,  236)  Thomas  Day  undertook  to 
ride  an  unbroken  colt,  and  was  killed  for  his  pains. — It  has  been  the 
custom  to  point  to  Day's  Sandford  and  Mcrtoun  as  an  example  of 
Rousseau's  direct  influence  on  English  thought.  After  a  careful 
examination,  however,  Jacques  Pons  concludes  that  Day  has  not 
held  to  the  fundamentals  of  Rousseau's  teachings,  and  that  we  are 
not  justified  in  calling  his  book  "The  Little  Emile"  or  'The 
English  Emile." 


108  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

thetic  observation  of  which  was  nursed  in  an  environment 
favorable  to  the  mood  of  universal  benevolence.  The  poet's 
convictions  were  strengthened  in  remote  hamlets  from  which 
as  a  vantage  point  the  new  message  was  sent  to  men  who 
were  moved  to  attempt  practical  reforms  on  individual 
initiative  or  through  the  agency  of  an  organized  institution 
like  the  church,  or  societies  that  grow  out  of  church  ac- 
tivities. Poets  had  to  contend  not  only  with  conditions,  but 
also  with  a  state  of  mind  that  was  responsible  for  those  con- 
ditions. They  fled  from  both  when  they  left  the  city,  but 
their  message  came  back  to  city  dwellers,  many  of  whom 
were  in  the  state  of  mind  illustrated  in  the  cynical  letter  of 
Lovelace  to  Bedford :  ''We  begin,  when  boys,  with  birds ; 
and  when  grown  up,  go  on  to  women ;  and  both,  perhaps, 
in  turn,  experience  our  sportive  cruelty."  ^  If  men  were 
to  be  aroused  to  sympathy  with  the  suffering  of  children, 
they  had  first  to  be  awakened  to  a  realization  that  kindness 
and  love  pervade  all  nature — even  the  nature  which  Somer- 
ville  held  to  have  been  created  for  the  sport  of  man.  Poets, 
who  were  the  earliest  to  awaken  to  a  heartfelt  brotherhood 
with  animals,  longed  for  the  solitary  places  where  cruelty 
and  cynicism  could  not  operate.  It  was  the  simple,  feeling 
poet,  nursed  in  solitude,  who  was  destined  to  win  men's 
hearts  to  consent  to  accept  the  spirit  of  benevolence  as  the 
moving  force  even  in  organized  society.  After  the  awaken- 
ing, men  were  ready,  toward  the  close  of  the  century,  for 
practical  reforms. 

II 

Readers  of  poetry  in  the  eighteenth  century  must  have 
responded  to  passages  on  childhood  that  now  seem  cold  and 
conventional.  In  Prospect  of  Peace,  Tickell  writes  of  Bri- 
tain's heroes, 

1  Clarissa  Harloive. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  109 

At  whose  dire  names   ten   thousand   widows   pressed 
Their  helpless  orphans   clinging  to  the   breast. 

The  image  of  the  widow  and  her  orphans  survives  lustily 
in  benevolist  poetry.  Although  it  is  difficult  for  the  modern 
reader  to  feel  the  emotional  stimulus  which  the  poet  un- 
doubtedly intended,  the  lines  on  widows  and  orphans  must 
have  suggested  a  coloring  of  sentiment  that  moved  tears 
and  a  just  indignation  against  social  wrongs.^  Those  poets 
who  felt  social  injustice,  constantly  employ  traditional 
phrases  in  lines  that  are  obviously  meant  to  arouse  com- 
passion. ^  Joseph  Warton  in  Library  calls  upon  his  readers 
to  "hark,  how  dying  infants  shriek."  Scott  in  Recruiting 
"hates  that  drum's  discordant  sound,"  which  suggests  only 
burning  towns  and  widows'  tears  and  orphans'  moans. 

Childhood  in  William  Whitehead's  Elegy  written  at  the 
convent  of  Haut  Villers  in  Champagne,  1754,  is  more  vital- 
ly conceived  than  in  Lovibond's  Ode  to  Youth,  J.  Warton's 
The  Revenge  of  America,  or  Graeme's  Loss  of  tJte  Aurora. 
On  the  banks  of  the  Marne,  the  workman  often  recalls  dis- 
astrous days  when  makers  of  war  taught  Christian  zeal  to 
authorize  their  crimes : 

Oft  to  his  children  sportive   on   the  grass 
Does    dreadful    tales    of    worn    tradition    tell. 

1  Beilby  Porteus's  Death  portrays  such  crashing  ruin  and  de- 
vastation that  there  is 

not  even  a  widow  left 
To  wail  her  sons. 

2  In  like  manner  children  are  introduced  in  tragedy  to  heighten 
effect,  as  in  Southerne's  The  Fatal  Marriage,  or  The  Innocent  Adul- 
tery, and  Oroonoko.  In  Home's  Douglas  the  child  appears  on  the 
stage  to  speak  those  appealing  lines  which  long  served  in  the  schools 
as  a  favorite  piece  for  declamation : 

My    name    is    Norval :    on    the    Grampian    hills, 
My  father  feeds  his  flocks.  .    .    . 


110  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Although  Smollett's  Tears  of  Scotland  (1746)  was  con- 
ceived in  horror  of  atrocities,  the  lines  seem  cold  and  con- 
ventional to  the  modern  reader.  Yet  in  its  day  the  poem 
must  have  evoked  tears  through  portrayal  of  the  misfor- 
tunes of  the  poor.  The  wretched  man  who  from  afar  sees 
his  property  destroyed  by  armies,  "Bethinks  him  of  his  babes 
and  wife,"  and  curses  his  fate.  Infants  perish  in  the  field, 
and  a  parent  who  is  driven  to  distraction  sheds  his  children's 
blood.  A  mother  who  hears  her  helpless  orphans  cry  for 
bread, 

Weeps    o'er    her    tender    babes    and    dies. 

Although  Gay  had  observed  slum  children  in  London, 
he  did  not  develop  the  humanitarian  aspects  of  his  material 
in  the  mood  of  Thomson  and  later  poets.  His  treatment  of 
London  waifs  has  only  a  suggestion  of  the  pathetic  ele- 
ment which  is  prominent  in  Steele's  sentimental  sketches  in 
the  Tatler.  The  new  ideal  is  expressed  in  Thomson's  lines 
on  Shaftesbury,  who  is 

The  generous  Ashley  thine,  the  friend  of  man; 
Who  scanned  his  nature  with  a  brother's  eye, 
His  weakness  prompt  to  shade,  to  raise  his  aim, 
To    touch    the    finer    movements    of    the    mind, 
And  with  the  moral  beauty  charm  the  heart.  ^ 

Thomson,  as  a  result,  portrays  conditions  that  add 
hardship  to  the  sufferings  of  children.  In  the  episode  of 
the  rider  and  horse  who  while  benighted  are  lost  in  the 
bogs,  the  wife  and  "plaintive  children"  vainly  await  the 
father's  return.-  In  another  familiar  passage  in  Winter 
the  father  is  overtaken  by  a  snow-storm,  and,  "stung  with 
thoughts  of   home,"   flounders   in   the   drifts.     Horror  fills 

^  Summer. 

2  Autumn. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  111 

his  heart  when  he  reahzes  that  in  place  of  being  near  his 
"tufted  cottage  rising  through  the  snow,"  he  is  far  from 
the  beaten  track.  As  he  sinks  helpless  into  the  drift, 
thoughts  of  "tender  anguish"  overtake  him.     He  thinks  of 

His  wife,   his   children,   and   his   friends   unseen. 

In  vain  for  him   the  officious   wife  prepares 

The   fire   fair-blazing,   and   the   vestment   warm; 

In  vain  his  little  children,  peeping  out 

Into    the    mingling    storm,    demand    their    sire, 

With  tears  of  artless  innocence.     Alas! 

Nor  wife,  nor  children,  more  shall  he  behold.   .    .    . 

Because  he  is  awake  to  social  wrongs,  Thomson  frankly 
makes  himself  the  poetic  advocate  of  the  unfortunate  and 
distressed  by  frequent  and  definite  interest  in  charity.  His 
philosophy  of  universal  benevolence  awakens  a  keen  reali- 
zation that  unassuming  worth  is  neglected,  and  that  the 
good  man's  share  is  often  gall  and  bitterness.  He  faces 
the  problem  of 

Why   the   lone   widow   and    her   orphans    pined 
In   starving  solitude;    while   luxury, 
In  palaces,  lay  straining  her  low  thought, 
To  form  unreal  wants. 

He  is  not  wholly  conventional  in  Lord  Talbot  when  that 
lord  is  praised  for  a  love  of  justice  that  led  him  to  cham- 
pion "trampled  want  and  worth"  and  defend  "sufifering 
right."  His  reward  is  the  hig'hest  tribute  the  helpless  widow 
and  her  orphans  can  give,  "The  widow's  sighs  and  orphan's 
tears"  of  gratitude.  ^ 

^  Compare  Fawkes's  On  the  Death  of  the  Earl  of  Uxbridge 
(1743).  Blair  in  William  Law  praises  the  charitable  work  of  Law 
and  his  fellow  workers  at  Kings  Clyffe.  The  spirit  of  benevolence 
is  praised  by  Mackenzie  in  Man  of  the  World:  "their  very  errors 
were  delightful  .  .  .  they  were  the  errors  of  benevolence,  genero- 
sity, and  virtue." 


112  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

In  the  same  mood  Thomson  hails  the  investigators  on 
the  jail  committee  of  1729  as  benefactors  of  mankind,  and 
calls  upon  them  as  true  patriots  to  resume  their  work.  He 
can  not  forget  the  generous  band  who  were  "touched  by 
human  woe"  to  search  the  gloomy  horrors  of  the  jail,  where, 
it  must  be  recalled,  incarcerated  men  lived  with  wife  and 
children,  as  is  clear  from  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield. 

Institutional  life  of  children  also  receives  his  attention. 
Among  the  blameless  poor  he  does  not  overlook 

The   helpless  young  that  kiss   no   mother's   hand. 

In  Liberty  he  states  his  conception  of  the  service  to  be  ren- 
dered by  public  institutions.  Referring  to  the  Foundling 
Hospital,  he  arouses  sympathy  for  the  work  of  salvaging 
orphans : 

The    dome    resounding   sweet    with    infant   joy, 
From  famine  saved,  and  cruel-handed  shame. 

If  men  will  realize  their  natural  duties,  the  tender-hearted 
pedestrian  need  no  longer  be  pained  by  the  sights  of  want 
and  misery: 

No  agonizing  infant,  that  ne'er  earned 
Its  guiltless  pangs 

will  be  seen  on  London  streets.  Thomson  is  the  first  Eng- 
lish poet  who  is  wholly  awakened  to  the  sufferings  endured 
by  children  of  those  who  eat  the  "bitter  bread  of  misery"  and 
who  shrink  into  the  "sordid  hut  of  cheerless  poverty" 
which  is  "pierced  by  wintry  winds."  ^  He  endeavors  to  stir 
the  social  consciousness  of  the  wealthy.  If  the  facts  were 
faced,  vice  in  high  places  would  stand  appalled,  and  the 
"heedless   rambling   impulse"   would   learn   to   think.     The 

1  Compare  Chatterton's  Resignation  for  a  description  of  an  un- 
sanitary cottage;  and  Crabbe's  Village,  Book  I,  11.  260—267. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  IMDUR  113 

heart  of  charity  would  Ix?  warmed  if  man  would  but  pause 
to  consider  the  stru^^gles  of  his  less  fortunate  fellows : 
"The  social  tear  would  rise,  the  social  sigh." 

Thomson  had  no  fear  that  his  ethical  interest  would  "de- 
form the  splendor  of  his  strain."  A  passage  in  Liberty 
(V,  660—666)  reveals  his  heartfelt  sympathy  with  helpless 
children.  He  notes  the  bounteous  stores  which  Britain  has 
provided  for  orphans,  and  bursts  into  a  fervid  lyrical  strain 
over  the  good  that  will  accrue  to  society  from  a  wise  con- 
servation of  childhood.  If  the  distresses  of  older  people  are 
relieved,  it  is  their  due;  but  if  the  wards  are  children,  they 
will  repay  the  "fondest  care." 

sweet 

The  morning  shines  in  mercy's  dews  arrayed. 

Lo !  how  they  rise !  these  families  of  Heaven ! 

That!    chief,    (but    why — ye    bigots! — why    so    late?) 

Where  blooms  and  warbles  glad  a  rising  age ; 

What   smiles    of   praise !    and,   while    their    song   ascends, 

The  listening  seraph  lays  his  lute  aside. 

Although  Thomson's  deep  interest  in  children's  welfare 
must  have  been  stirred  by  recollections  of  hardship  suffered 
by  his  widowed  mother  in  the  care  of  her  children,  the 
personal  note  is  not  heard  in  his  lines. 

Akenside  and  Collins  write  in  the  same  mood.  In  JPlii- 
ter  Solstice  (1740)  Akenside,  an  ardent  benevolist,  contrasts 
city  and  country  life  during  a  snow-storm.  City  folk  are 
dancing,  singing,  or  are  comfortable  by  a  "splendid  fire." 

Meantime,  perhaps,  with  tender  fears, 
Some  village  dame  the  curfew  hears. 
While  round  the  hearth  the  children  play: 
At  morn  their  father  went  abroad  ; 
The  moon  is  sunk,  and  deep  the  road ; 
She  sighs,  and  wonders  at  his  stay. 

With  less  reticence  than  Akenside,  Collins  in  Ode  on  Popu- 
lar Superstitions  develops  the  episode  of  the  shepherd  who, 


114  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

bewildered  in  the  fens,  was  drowned  far  from  his  flocks  and 
cottage : 

For  him  in  vain  his  anxious  wife  shall  wait, 
Or  wander  forth  to  meet  him  on  his  way ; 
For  him  in  vain  at  to-fall  of  the  day, 
His   babes    shall    linger    at    the   unclosing   gate. 

The  poetry  of  Richard  Savage  is  interesting  in  that  it 
supplements  Thomson's  generalized  appeal  for  universal 
benevolence  by  occasionally  breaking  through  the  restraint 
which  literary  conventions  laid  upon  poets  of  the  age.  In 
his  Wanderer  he  tells  how  children  unjustly  suffer  many 
penalties,  and  are  brought  up  obscurely  in  a  life  of  want  and 
shame,  as  a  result  of  the  indiscretions  of  parents.  He 
trembles  at  the  thought  that  there  are  mothers  capable  of 
exposing  children. 

In  a  poem  inscribed  with  "all  due  reverence  to  Mrs. 
Brett,  once  Countess  of  Macclesfield,  and  finished  in  the 
hours  of  deepest  melancholy,"  he  writes  bitterly  of  his 
mother.  ^  He  charges  that  she  pushed  him  out  upon  the 
sea  of  life,  launching  him  without  an  oar.  The  concluding 
paragraphs  disclose  bitter  invective.  No  mother's  devotion 
shielded  his  infant  innocence  with  prayer:  no  father's  hand 
restrained  him  from  vice  or  upheld  him  in  virtue. 

Mother,    miscalled,    farewell — of    soul    severe, 
This  sad  reflection  yet  may  force  a  tear; 
All  I  was  wretched  by,  to  you  I  owed, 
Alone    from    strangers    every    comfort    flowed. 

In  an  age  when  the  doctrine  of  universal  benevolence  per- 
meated poetry,  and  when  sentimental  comedy  and  domestic 
tragedy  were  popular,  such  passages  must  have  made  a 
strong  emotional  appeal.  His  story,  according  to  which  he 
becomes  a  modern  instance  of  exposure,  won  a  favorable 

1  The  Bastard. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  115 

hearing  not  only  from  Johnson,  whose  "Life  of  Savage" 
reads  Hke  a  romance,  but  also  from  Lady  Montagu  and 
Aaron  Hill,  who  befriended  him. 

In  the  poem  Of  Public  Spirit  (in  regard  to  Public 
Works),  Savage  attacks  luxury  with  its  artificialities  and 
pompous  whims  as  they  appear  in  landscaped  gardens. 
Man's  interest  should  not  be  selfish,  but  social.  Thinking 
of  his  own  experience,  he  holds  that  there  is  need  in  the 
nation  for  public  institutions  for  the  care  of  waifs.  He  em- 
phasizes the  need  of  conserving  the  child.  The  thoughtful 
care  of  the  state  should  not  allow  the  helpless  to  suffer  for 
errors  not  their  own.  His  suggestion  that  the  mother 
should  be  shielded  provided  the  child  is  conserved,  is  the 
same  in  intention  as  the  legislation  that  marks  Napoleon 
among  statesmen  as  a  friend  of  children.  Savage  also  con- 
sidered himself  to  have  suffered  injustice  from  the  state, 
which  is  the  ward  of  orphans.  He  reproaches  unkind  peers 
for  having  neglected  his  rights. 

The   senate  next,   whose   aid   the   helpless   own, 
Forgot  my  infant  wrongs,  and  mine  alone. 

William  Hamilton's  Ode  (on  the  new  year,  i/S9)  is  a 
severe  arraignment  of  luxury.  No  one  is  so  hateful  to  him 
as  the  person  in  power  who  misuses  orphans.  He  pours 
contempt  on  the  avaricious  who  squander  on  a  luxurious 
dinner  what  they  "Stole  from  the  orphan  and  the  poor." 
Could  not  "impious  greatness"  give  the  smallest  alms  from 
its  "vile  profusion"?  "One  table's  vain  intemperate  load" 
would  have  provided  health  and  bread  for  cottage  children.  ^ 
If  the  worldling  would  but  listen,  the  oft-repeated  words  of 

1  Hamilton,  like  other  benevolist  poets  after  1730,  leaned 
heavily  on  Thomson.  Cp.  Summer  for  a  description  of  a  spend- 
thrift, who  squandered  on  himself 

what   might   have   cheered 
A   drooping   family   of   modest   worth. 


116  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

gratitude  expressed  by  cottagers  would  be  sweeter  and  more 
appealing  in  their  simple  sincerity  than  the  seducing  trills  of 
Farinelli.  Hamilton  holds  that  no  degeneracy  is  greater 
than  that  of  the  man  who  was  by  nature  kind,  but  who  has 
been  corrupted  by  idle  dreams  of  greatness  in  the  form  of 
ribbons  and  coronets  to  the  point  where  he  "Unmoved  shall 
riot  at  the  orphan's  cost."  His  muse  will  lay  bare  their 
treachery,  and  then  let  conscience  judge  ''between  the  op- 
pressed and  you." 

See,  there,  undried,  the  widow's  tears; 
See,  there,  unsoothed,  the  orphans'  fears. 

Robert  Glynn  has  pictured  the  roll  call  of  such  agents 
of  misery  in  The  Day  of  Judgment. 

Here  are  they 
Whom  fraud  and  skilful  treachery  long  secured; 
Who  from  the  infant  virgin  tore  her  dower. 
And    ate    the    orphan's    bread: — who    spent    their    stores 
In  selfish  luxury. 

In  the  spirit  of  Hogarth,  Somerville  in  Bowling-Green  draws 
a  picture  of  Gripe,  the  lawyer,  who  is  jovial  with  the  fat 
client, 

But  if  the  abandoned  orphan  puts  his  case, 

* 

How  like  a  cur  he  snarls. 
Armstrong  refers  in  Benevolence  (1751)  to  a  whole  family 
of  orphans  who  ought  to  be  snatched  from  fate.  Scott's 
Palemon,  or  Benevolence,  is  a  moral  lecture  to  prosperous 
farmers  in  the  valley  of  Avon.  In  The  Melancholy  Evening 
he  states  that  to  the  feeling  heart  it  is  a  joy  to  alleviate  pain 
and  relieve  poverty,  but 

Avarice  grasps  his  useless  store, 
Though  Misery's  plaints  his  aid  implore, 
Though  he,  her  ruined  cottage  nigh, 
Beholds  her  famished  infants  lie, 
And  hears  their  faint,  their  last  expiring  cry! 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  117 

After  the  middle  of  the  century  the  reader  begins  to 
suspect  the  genuineness  of  the  orphan  who  is  mentioned 
with  clock-Hke  regularity  in  connection  with  the  charity 
motive.  The  conventional  attitude  is  not  felt  in  Thomson 
because  he  is  warmed  by  a  fine  benevolence,  and  has  the 
additional  advantage  of  being  a  pioneer;  but  constant  repe- 
tition of  what  seems  hke  a  colorless  reference  palls  on  the 
modern  reader  until  he  wonders  whether  these  poets  could 
have  made  an  impression  even  in  their  day.  But  the  benev- 
olist  poetry,  which  grows  in  force  after  Rousseau  and  the 
industrial  revolution,  still  clings  to  the  orphan  as  a  favorite 
figure  for  pathos. 

Langhorne's  Country-Justice  (1774 — 1777)  calls  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that  unnumbered 

objects  ask  thy  honest  care, 
Beside  the  orphan's  tear,  the  widow's  prayer. 
He  too  wishes  to  alleviate  the  distresses  of  poverty  by  re- 
straining the  wealthy  from  wanton  cruelty.  He  resents  the 
intrusions  of  landscaping  and  architecture  in  rural  places, 
and  plainly  addresses  city  people  of  wealth  as  "ye  apes  of 
modern  race"  and  ''ye  reptile  cits,"  and  writes  that  Plutus 
may  growl  over  his  ill-got  gains,  while  Mercury,  the  god 
of  stealth,  and  Janus,  the  shopman  with  double  face,  perch 
upon  ledgers  of  city  merchants.  In  the  pretentious  towers 
of  the  nabob  he  sees  razed  villages,  "And  tears  of  orphans 
watering  every  tree." 

His  chief  concern  is  to  overcome  the  injustice  committed 
upon  society  by  the  failure  of  courts  to  recognize  the  good 
qualities  of  man,  so  that  a  verdict  is  given  or  sentence 
pronounced  upon  an  evil-doer  without  reference  to  motives 
which  prompted  the  deed.  In  one  of  the  ancient  halls 
which  he  prefers  because  they  do  not  harbor  a  class  of 
heartless  rich  (he  refers  to  the  capitalists  who  bought  up 
land  to  compete  with  the  landed  nobility)   stands  a  magis- 


118  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

terial  chair  from  which  true  justice  is  dispensed  by  a  stern 
but  just  judge  who  displays 

Honor's   strong  beam,   and    Mercy's   melting   shade ; 
Justice,  that,  in  the  rigid  paths  of  law, 
Would  still   some  drop   from   Pity's   fountain  draw ; 
Bend  o'er  her  urn  with  many  a  generous  fear, 
Ere    his    firm    seal    should    force    an    orphan's    tear. 
Langhorne  is  in  earnest.     He  wishes  to  have  justice  dis- 
pensed in  a  way  that  Shaftesbury  would  have  approved. 
Henry  Headley's  Rosalind's  Dying  Complaint  (to  her 
sleeping  child)  is  a  poem  of  eleven  stanzas,  in  which  the  un- 
married mother  weeps  over  her  babe  whose  ''cruel  far-off 
father"  has  left  her  to  face  unkind  friends  and  cruel  parents. 
Headley  has  frankly  treated  his  subject  in  a  vein  of  senti- 
mentalism.     Unlike   the   vigorously   human   mother   in   the 
Elizabethan  lyric  on  the  same  theme,  Rosalind  does  not  face 
her  guilt,  but  lays  her  misfortunes  to  the  injustice  wrought 
by  organized  society.     She  does  not  long  forget  herself  in 
the  plight  of  her  child,  but  blames  the  "ungentle  hand  of 
rude  mischance"  that  has  reft  her  heart  of  rest.     She  is 
awakened  not  so  much  to  mother  instincts  as  to  a  sense  of 
innocence  not  recognized  in  her  environment.     Her  mother 
will  not  hear  her  speak,  and  her  father  knits   his  brow. 
''Sweet  Heavens!  were  they  never  young?"     Her  friends 
forsake  her  and  smile  when  she  thinks  of  her  ''true  love" 
who  broke  his  word.     The  sentimental  shift  of  responsibility 
from  the  individual  to  society  is  clear  in  her  exclamation, 
May    God    amend    their    cruel    hearts, 
For  surely  they're  to  blame.  ^ 

1  In  Frederick  (1794),  Southey's  sentimental  standard,  which 
is  implied  in  the  "Botany-Bay  Eclogues"  generally,  leads  him  to 
portray  Frederick  as  shifting  the  blame  for  his  faults  to  society, 
even  in  the  act  of  praying  for  forgiveness  from  God. 

If    I    have    sinned    against    mankind,    on    them 
Be  that  past   sin;   they  made   me   what   I   was. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  119 

Headley  is  interested  in  this  phase  of  the  subject,  and 
the  child  is  hardly  more  than  a  text  for  preachment  of 
sentimental  doctrine  of  the  individual  abused  by  society. 
Rosalind  wakes  but  to  weep  while  she  kisses  her  baby's 
"pretty  hand."  and  hears  in  the  midnight  tolHng  a  call  to 
the  "grass-green  sward."  Therefore  she  makes  no  brave 
fight  for  life  to  protect  her  child,  but  succumbs  to  forces  at 
w'ork  against  her. 

Alas!  my  dearest  baby 

I  grieve  to  see  thee  smile; 
I  think  upon  thy  rueful  lot, 

And  cold's  my  heart  the  while. 

'Gainst  wind  and  tide  of  worldly  woe, 

I  cannot  make  my  way; 
To  lull  thee  in  my  bosom  warm, 

I  feel  I  must  not  stay. 

Jerningham's  The  Magdalens  (1763)  engages  "soft- 
eyed  Pity"  in  the  cause  of  fallen  women  who  have  been 
rescued  by  Hanway's  house  of  charity.  They  fell  through 
no  fault  of  theirs. 

Once  destitute  of  counsel,  aid,  or  food, 
Some    helpless    orphans    in    this    dome    reside, 
Who  (like  the  wandering  children  in  the  wood) 
Trod    the    rude    paths    of    life    without    a    g^iide. 

They  had  been  won  to  evil  by  persuasive  words  that  moved 
their  generous  nature,  and  were  hurried  into  situations 
which  "their  inborn  virtue  disapproved."  ^     Though  early 

1  Compare  The  Prostitute  of  H.  K.  White: 

Once    wert    thou    happy — thou    wert    once    innocent : 
But  the  seducer  beguiled  thee  in  artlessness. 
Then  he  abandoned  thee  unto  thine  infamy. 


120  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

stained,  they  now  claim  a  second  innocence  which  is,  how- 
ever, disturbed  by  memories  of  past  suffering.  One  of  the 
unfortunates  recalls  how  she  had  been  abandoned  to  wander 
in  the  storm  with  her  helpless  babes,  \Vho  died  of  hunger ; 
and  she  still  cries  out  in  agony  of  soul  against  her  seducer. 
Jerningham  appeals  to  man's  humanity  not  to  deride  them 
now  or  to  mock  their  undeserved  penitential  woes. 

'Tis    Virtue's    task   to    soothe    affliction's    smart, 
To  join  in  sadness  with  the  fair  distrest ; 
Wake  to  another's   pain  the   tender   heart, 
And    move    to    clemency    the    generous    breast. 

Jerningham's  Margaret  of  Ayijoii,  An  Historical  Inter- 
lude, illustrates  how  a  wave  of  sentiment  was  made  to  en- 
gulf the  audience.  The  advertisement  says:  'This  histori- 
cal interlude  is  upon  the  same  plan  that  Rousseau  com- 
posed his  Pygmalion,  which  is  a  new  species  of  dramatic 
entertainment  consisting  of  a  monologue  that  is  often  sus- 
pended by  the  interposition  of  music,  which  must  sympa- 
thize with  the  passions  and  feelings  of  the  personage  who  is 
supposed  to  speak."  After  a  lost  battle  Margaret  leads 
in  her  child,  who  falls  asleep  under  a  tree  while  the  mother, 
''hanging  fondly  over  him,"  relates  his  woes.  When  the 
child  wakes,  he  asks  for  his  slain  father.  A  ruffian  bent  on 
pillage  enters  at  this  moment,  but  is  moved  to  compassion 
by  the  mother's  appeals  for  humanity,  and  reforms  on  the 
spot. 

Jerningham,  whose  old  age  carried  him  over  into  the 
new  century,  is  characterized  in  Gifford's  Baeviad  as  ''sniv- 
eling Jerningham,"  and  is  depicted  as  weeping  at  the  age  of 
fifty  "o'er  love-lorn  oxen  and  deserted  sheep."  But  that 
his  poems  served  the  practical  purposes  of  reform  is  evi- 
dent from  the  statement  of  Hanway,  who  credits  him  with 


CHILDREX   OF  THE   POOR  121 

having  materially  aided  by  his  poetry  in  the  establishment 
of  the  Magdalen  House.  ' 

Two  poems  by  H.  K.  White  are  sentimental  studies.  A 
Ballad  depicts  a  "heart-sick  weary  wanderer,"  whose  "faith- 
less lover"  cruelly  left  her  "faint  and  lone"  after  she  had 
been  disowned  by  her  parents. 

My  child  moans  sadly  in  my  arms. 

The  winds  they  will  not  let  it  sleep : 
Ah,  little  knows  the   hapless  babe 

What  makes  its  wretched  mother  weep ! 

Now  lie  thee  still,  my  infant  dear, 

I  cannot  bear  thy  sobs  to  see ; 
Harsh  is  thy  father,  little  one, 

And  never  will  he  shelter  thee. 

Oh,  that  I  were  but  in  my  grave, 

And  winds  were  piping  o'er  me  loud. 
And  thou,  my  poor,  my  orphan  babe, 

Wert  nestling  in  thy  mother's  shroud ! 

The  Lullaby  of  a  Female  Convict  to  her  Child  (The  Night 
Previous  to  Execution)  is  typical,  both  in  choice  of  sub- 
ject and  treatment,  of  the  desire  to  shield  an  unfortunate 

1  Jonas  Hanway  was  a  friend  of  children.  In  1761  he  ob- 
tained an  act  which  obliged  all  London  parishes  to  keep  an  annual 
register  of  parish  infants;  and  another  act  by  which  such  infants 
within  the  bills  of  mortality  must  be  housed  not  in  a  workhouse,  but, 
until  they  were  six  years  of  age,  beyond  a  specified  number  of  miles 
outside  London.  In  1759  he  published  A  Candid  Historical  Account 
of  the  Hospital  for  the  Reception  of  Exposed  and  Deserted  Young 
Children,  and  Thoughts  on  the  Plan  for  a  Magdalen  House  for  Re- 
pentant Prostitutes.  How  closely  poetry  is  wrapped  up  with  hu- 
manitarian reform  is  clear  from  the  relation  of  Jerningham  to  the 
project  of  Hanway  for  rescuing  fallen  women.  (Consult  Dic- 
tionary of  National  Biography,  s.  v.  Jerningham,  Edward.)  In 
1766  Hanway  published  An  Earnest  Appeal  for  Mercy  to  the  Chil- 
dren of  the  Poor,  and  in  1767  Letters  on  the  Importance  of  the 
Rising  Generation  of  the  Labouring  Part  of  Our  fellozv  Subjects. 


122  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

mother.  White  does  not  arouse  sympathy  by  mere  com- 
ment, but  appeals  to  the  reader's  sensibiHties  by  reproducing 
the  mother's  words.  UnHke  those  of  Headley's  RosaHnd, 
the  mother's  thoughts  are  wholly  absorbed  in  her  child, 
whom  she  addresses,  and  whose  fate  she  bemoans.  The 
closing  stanza  is  characteristic  of  the  whole  poem : 

Sleep,  baby  mine — Tomorrow  I  must  leave  thee. 
And  I  would  snatch  an  interval  of  rest : 

Sleep  these  last  moments  ere  the  laws  bereave  thee, 
For  never  more  thou'lt  press  a  mother's  breast. 

The  sentimental  shift  of  responsibility  is  obvious  in 
sentimental  comedy  and  domestic  tragedy.  In  Aaron  Hill's 
tragedy  The  Fatal  Extravagance  (1721),  the  hero's  mis- 
deeds are  sympathetically  palliated  by  reference  to  evil  com- 
panionship in  youth.  Through  his  generosity,  Bellmour 
had  allowed  himself  to  be  lured  into  evil  ways.  His  ap- 
peal to  his  wife  is  made  not  for  himself : 

Thine  and  thy  helpless  infants'  woes  rise  to  me. 
Glare  on  my  apprehension  like  pale  ghosts, 
And  point  me  into  madness. 

Although  the  problem  of  the  tragedy  centers  about  the 
fate  of  Bellmour,  the  parental  emotions  of  Louisa  and  Bell- 
mour lead  them  to  speak  constantly  of  their  children.  When 
she  realizes  that  he  has  gambled  away  their  fortune,  she 
thinks  only  of  her  husband,  and  says  to  his  uncle, 

How,    then,    will    he    support    the    weeping    anguish, 
Of  three  poor  children,  all  undone  by  him? 

Courtney  wishes  he  might  shield  her,  but  Louisa  is  moved 
only  by  Bellmour's  distress,  and  trembles  at  the  thought  of 
looking  upon  his  face : 

His  ruined  family  hangs  on  his  heart, 

His    helpless    children's    future    state    distracts    him, 

And  the  once  lively  Bellmour  smiles  no  more. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  I»OOK  123 

Bellmour  is  moved  by  the  thought  of  his  poverty-stricken 

children : 

To  die  at  once, 
Were  comfort  even  in  agony. — But   1   shall  be, 
Whole  ages,  after  death,  in  dying — Villains, 
Dull,  pitiless,  insulting,  dirty  villains, 
Will  point  at  some  poor  ragged  child  of  mine. 
And  say,  "There's  pride  and  name !     .     .     . 
There's  the  blest  remnant  of  a  boasted  family !" 

Writers  of  domestic  tragedy  until  late  in  the  century  were 
prompt  to  shield  the  weakness  of  a  fellow  man  and  to  see 
evil  as  a  shade  of  good  which  man  but  faintly  comprehends. 
Since  the  days  of  the  miracle  play  Abrahnm  and  Isaac, 
children  had  been  employed  in  tragedy  to  heighten  eflfect. 
Yet  writers  of  domestic  tragedy  in  the  eighteenth  century 
show  no  advance  over  their  predecessors  in  the  treatment 
of  the  child  element.  ^ 

George  Lillo's  apprentice  tragedy,  Th^e  London  Mer- 
chant, or  the  History  of  George  Barnwell  ( 1731 )  was  played 
yearly  before  apprentices  until  the  days  of  Charles  Lamb, 
who  remarked  upon  its  easy  morality.  Lillo  has  changed 
the  deliberate  villian  of  the  ballad  into  a  merchant's  clerk 
who  is  led  on  by  the  courtesan  Millwood  to  embezzle  money 
and  murder  his  uncle.  In  his  crimes,  Maria,  the  daughter 
of  his  employer  Thorowgood,  can  see  only  the  results  of 
misguided  innocence.  The  sincerely  penitent  I'arnwell  is 
executed,  but  has  not  lacked  the  sympathy  and  affection  of 
his  fellow  clerk  Trueman,  Maria,  and  her  father,  who  to 
the  end  have  confidence  in  the  goodness  of  his  heart. 
Trueman  says  to  Maria,  "So  well  I  know  him,  I'm  sure 
this  act  of  his,  so  contrary  to  his  nature,  must  have  been 
caused  by  some  unavoidable  necessity."     Thorowgood  de- 

1  Compare    Addison's    extended    ridicule    of    weeping    widows 
with  orphaned  children  in  tragedies.      (Spectator,  No.  44.^ 


124  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

nounces  Millwood :  "I  know  how,  step  by  step,  you've  led 
him  on,  reluctant  and  unwilling.  .  .  .  But  Heaven,  who 
knows  our  frame,  and  graciously  distinguishes  between 
frailty  and  presumption,  will  make  a  difference,  though  man 
can  not,  who  sees  not  the  heart,  but  only  judges  by  the  out- 
ward action." 

The  new  standards,  then,  influenced  dramatists  and 
poets  alike.  The  dramatists  Hill,  Lillo,  Benjamin  Victor, 
and  Cumberland  were  working  in  the  same  mood  as  Jern- 
ingham,  Headley,  Southey,  and  White.  ^ 

Langhorne  strikes  at  the  root  of  the  problem  of  charity. 
He  is  not  content  to  stop  with  superficial  charity  that  strives 
to  ameliorate  conditions  by  gifts  of  food  and  clothing;  but 
he  endeavors  to  remove  the  causes  of  poverty  and  distress  by 
educating  country  justices  to  note  motives  and  environment 
as  influences  that  must  be  taken  into  account  if  an  intelligent 
judgment  is  to  be  pronounced.  Before  making  his  de- 
cision, a  judge  must  determine  whether  the  deed  was  prompt- 
ed by  vice  or  nature,  and  must  take  into  account  "the  strong 
temptation  and  the  need."  Justices  must  learn  to  know  con- 
ditions which  caused  distress,  in  order  to  relieve  it.  They 
can  remove  the  cause  by  themselves  hearing  the  testimony 
of  unfortunate  cottagers,  in  place  of  turning  them  over  to 
petty  rascals  like  parish  officers. 

Langhorne  is  especially  concerned  with  the  inhumanity 
of  parish  ofiicers,  who,  as  is  known  from  other  sources, 
played  a  shameful  part  as  agents  in  farming  out  helpless 
children  to  industrial  establishments.  He  looks  upon  the 
parish  officer  as  a  monster  furnished  with  a  human  frame. 
The  magistrate  should  ''shake  the  reptile  soul"  of  such  a 

1  For  an  analysis  of  other  sentimental  plays  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  but  without  special  reference  to  childhood,  see  Ernest 
Bernbaum,  The  Drama  of  Sensibility. 


CIIII.nRKX  OF  TIIK   I'OOR  125 

"caitiff  wretch."  Langhorne  knows  of  a  landowner  on 
whose  estates  no  bailiff  wields  petty  power.  The  master 
himself  looks  to  it  that  the  sick  have  medicine  and  the  aged 
bread.  rPo  illustrate  his  faith  in  human  nature.  Langhorne 
cites  the  instance  of  a  "pitying  robber"  who  came  upon  a 
new-born  babe  under  a  thorn  and 

To  the  next  cot  the  trembling  infant  bore, 
And  gave  a  part  of  what  he  stole  before. 

He  was  a  stranger  in  the  community  ;  but  he  had  the  instincts 
of  a  man.  and  "dropped  a  human  tear."  On  the  other 
hand,  the  penniless  mother  of  this  child  had  received  cruel 
treatment  from  parish  officers  who  had  driven  her  far 
"beyond  the  town's  last  limits."  ^  Langhorne's  standards 
of  justice  demand  that  the  magistrate  should  pause  "if  Vir- 
tue's slightest  sparks  remain."  He  is  the  sole  protector  of 
unpitied  women,  and  should  consider  well  before  commit- 
ting them  to  the  "shameless  lash"  and  the  "hardening  jail." 
The  dictates  of  humanity  require  that  he  be  forbearing. 

The  downcast  eye.  the  tear  that  flows  amain. 

As  if  to  ask  her  innocence  again; 

The   plaintive   babe,   that   slumbering   seemed    to    lie 

On  her  soft  breast,  and  wakes  at  the   heaved  sigh; 

The  cheek  that  wears  the  beauteous  robe  of  shame; 

How  loath  they  leave  a  gentle  breast  to  blame. 

Langhorne's  poem  touched  hearts  long  after  its  publi- 
cation. This  is  evident  from  his  biographer's  statement: 
"It  would  be  difficult  to  find  anywhere  lines  more  affecting 
than  those  which  in  the  first  part  describe  the  soldier's  widow 
weeping  over  her  child.  The  benevolent  spirit  which  per- 
vades the  whole  of  the  poem  cannot  be  too  warmly  praised. "-' 

1   Parish  officers  were  especially  cruel   in   instances  like  this. 

-  The  Life  of  John  Langlionic,  by  R.  A.  Davenport.  Esq..  in 
The  British  Poets  (Chiswick),  1822,  Vol.  LXV. 


126  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Cowper  was  familiar  with  the  sufferings  of  cottage  chil- 
dren from  having  assisted  Newton  in  charitable  work.  At 
his  own  winter  evening  fireside,  Cowper  enjoys  the  peaceful 
cozy  recess  and  the  calm  which  restore  him  to  himself  while 
the  storm  is  raging  without.  On  such  a  night  the  poor  have 
a  "friend  in  every  feeling  heart."  There  is  irony  in  his 
statement  that  the  ill-clad  and  sparsely- fed  peasant  who  is 
heated  by  his  day's  labor  finds  time  to  cool  in  his  cottage. 
Cowper's  heart  goes  out  to  the  children  clustered  about  the 
ineffective  fire.  Close  observation  is  reflected  in  the  pathetic 
lines  which  show  how  they  warmed  their  hands  by  the  in- 
sufficient aid  of  a  candle  flame. 

The  frugal  housewife   trembles  when  she   lights 

Her  scanty  stock  of  brushwood,  blazing  clear, 

But  dying  soon,  like  all  terrestrial  joys. 

The  few  small  embers  left  she  nurses  well; 

And    while    her   infant    race,    with    outspread    hands 

And   crowded   knees,   sit   cowering   o'er    the    sparks, 

Retires,  content  to  quake,  so  they  be  warmed. 

The  man  feels  least,  as  more  inured  than  she 

To  winter,   and   the  current   in   his   veins 

More  briskly  moved  by  his  severer  toil ; 

Yet  he  too  finds  his  own  distress  in  theirs. 

The  taper  soon  extinguished,  which  I  saw 

Dangled  along  at  the  cold  fingers'  end 

Just   when   the   day   declined.   .    .    . 

* 

Sleep  seems  their  only  refuge :  for,  alas ! 
Where  penury  is  felt  the  thought  is  chained. 
And  sweet  colloquial  pleasures  are  but  few.  ^ 

Where  he  fails  to  sympathize  with  robust  children  at  play, 
his  inmost  soul  is  moved  by  the  distress  of  children  suffer- 
ing from  hunger  and  cold. 

1  The  Task,  IV,  380-398- 


CHILDREN  OF  THE   POUR 


127 


Two  of  Cowper's  most  successful  pictures  of  childhood 
reveal  sympathetic  observation  of  children  suffering  from 
cold.  In  Truth  there  is  an  effective  portrait  of  a  boy  out  at 
service  to  an  old  maid.  Covvper  is  obviously  amused  by  the 
"ancient  prude"  and  her  shabby  gentility,  but  is  in  full 
sympathy  with  the  incongruously  dressed  and  freezing  boy. 
Without  the  footnote  reference  to  Hogarth's  Morning,  it  is 
evident  that  Cowper's  conception  of  the  boy  and  his  pious 
mistress  is  in  the  mood  of  Hogarth.  Although  given  to 
thrift  and  parsimony, 

She  yet  allows  herself  that  boy  behind ; 

The  shivering  urchin,  bending  as  he  goes. 

With   slipshod  heels,  and   devvdrop  at   his  nose, 

His  predecessor's  coat  advanced  to  wear. 

Which  future  pages  yet  are  doomed  to  share, 

Carries  her  Bible  tucked  beneath  his  arm, 

And  hides  his  hands  to  keep  his  fingers  warm.  ^ 

^  Although  the  lot  of  apprentices  must  have  been  unusually 
hard  because  of  long  hours  and  close  supervision,  poets  before  Blake 
have  not  noticed  them  with  any  show  of  sympathy.  Blake's  two 
poems  on  chimney-sweepers  notice  the  lot  of  what  Lamb  called  these 
"dim  specks — poor  blots — innocent  blacknesses"  who  "from  their 
little  pulpits  (the  tops  of  chimneys),  in  the  nipping  air  of  a  December 
morning,  preach  a  lesson  of  patience  to  mankind."  Lamb  senti- 
mentalizes his  observation  of  these  poor  children.  As  a  child  he 
had  pursued  them  in  imagination  as  they  "went  sounding  on  through 
so  many  dark  stifling  caverns,  horrid  shades" — to  shudder  with  the 
idea  that  "  now,  surely,  he  must  be  lost  forever."  Lamb  does  not  as 
much  as  allude  to  the  cruelties  to  which  these  climbing  boys  were 
subjected.  It  is  known  that  their  masters  forced  them  into  chim- 
neys by  prodding  them  with  sharp  instruments  and  even  by  building 
a  fire  under  them.  When  James  Montgomery  of  Sheffield  edited 
The  Chimney-Sweeper's  Friend,  and  the  Climbing  Boy's  Albumt 
(1824)  in  order  to  stimulate  philanthropic  interest  in  legislation 
favoring  these  abused  children,  Lamb  sent  in,  as  his  contribution, 
Blake's  poem  from  the  Songs  of  Innocence,  which  carried  the  head- 
ing "Communicated  by  Mr.  Charles  Lamb,  from  a  very  curious  little 


128  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Like  Langhorne,  Cowper  notices  dishonest  parish  offi- 
cers, who  are  partial  in  the  distribution  of  charity.  His 
cottagers  would  rather  suffer  the  pangs  of  hunger  than  sub- 
mit to  the  "rugged  frowns  and  insolent  rebuffs"  of  knaves 
in  office.  He  cheers  them  with  the  hope  of  assistance  from 
his  household ;  a  distant  benefactor,  who  can  be  identified 
as  Lord  Carrington,  will  keep  them  from  want.  Their  hope 
may  also  lie  justly  in  their  children: 

Time  will  give  increase, 
And  all  your  numerous  progeny,  well  trained 
But   helpless,    in    few   years    shall    find    their    hands, 
And  labor  too. 

Cowper,  whose  humanitarianism  was  prompted  by  evan- 
gelical fervor,  makes  a  plea  like  that  of  Langhorne.  He 
considers  the  instance  of  a  thief  who  steals  by  night  to 
feed  his  family.  Cowper  holds  that  there  is  some  excuse 
for  him  if  pity  for  their  sufferings  warps  aside  his  principles, 
and  tempts  him  into  sin  for  the  support  of  his  destitute 
family.  But  having  gone  so  far,  Cowper  feels  it  necessary 
to  balance  the  scales  by  a  vigorous  denunciation  of  the  villian 

Who  starves  his  own,  who  persecutes  the  blood 
He  gave  them  in  his  children's  veins,  and  hates 
And  wrongs  the  woman  he  has  sworn  to  love. 

Thomas  Russell  is  likewise  thinking  in  terms  of  religious 
belief  when  he  chides  a  young  man  for  not  being  moved  to 
sympathy  by  cottage  children. 

Could    then    the    babes    from    yon    unsheltered    cot 
Implore  thy  passing  charity  in  vain  ? 

work."     Late  in  the  eighteenth  century,  Joseph  Blackct,  a  Yorkshire 
poet,  strikes  a  personal  note  in  Reason's  Address  to  the  Poet,  in  the 
opening  stanzas  of  which  he  refers  to  his  apprenticeship  to  a  cobbler: 
Child  of  mischance!  by  fortune's  favourites  spurned. 
At  distance  from  the  good,  the  truly  great. 
In  broken  accents  my  hard  lot  I  mourned, 
In  sighs  lamented  my  unhappy  fate. 


CHILDREN  OF  Tllli:   POOR  129 

Russell   follows  orthodox   theology  by   postponing  the   re- 
ward of  the  distressed  cottagers  to  a  future  world. 

Too  thoughtless  youth!  what  though  thy  happier  lot 
Insult  their  life  of  poverty  and  pain. 
What  though  their  Maker  doomed  them,  thus  forlorn. 
To  brook  the  mockery  of  the  taunting  throng, 
Beneath   the   oppressor's   iron   scourge   to   mourn. 
To  mourn  but  not  to  murmur  at  his  wrong. 
Yet  when  their  last  late  evening  shall  decline, 
Their  evening  cheerful,  though  their  day  distressed, 
A  hope  perhaps  more  heavenly  bright  than  thine, 
A  grace  by  thee  unsought  and  unpossessed, 
A  faith  more  fixed,  a  rapture  more  divine 
Shall  gild  their  passage  to  eternal  rest. 

The  benevolists  differ  from,  poets  like  Cowper  and 
Russell  in  that  the  benevolists,  whose  attitude  is  conditioned 
by  Shaftesbury's'  doctrine  of  natural  goodness,  did  not  post- 
pone redress  to  an  unknowable  future.  They  insisted  that 
the  benevolent  instincts  of  man  should  be  given  free  play 
in  this  life  in  order  that  all  men  may  be  partakers  of  the 
happiness  which  their  maker  intended  they  should  enjoy.  ^ 
Because  of  the  natural  goodness  and  instinctive  benevolence 
which  he  ascribed  to  man,  Shaftesbury  had  definitely 
attacked  the  "rod  and  sweetmeat"  doctrine  as  unnecessary 
and,  in  fact,  harmful.  Scott  of  Amvvell  is  conscious  of  a 
cleavage  between  himself  and  those  who  believe,  for  in- 
stance, in  predestination.  The  optimistic  quaker  poet 
apologizes  for  sentiments  he  expresses  in  The  Melancholy 
Evening.  \The  following  lines  from  that  poem  clearly  re- 
veal the  temper  of  those  who  followed  Shaftesbury.  Scott 
has  been  writing  of  the  plagues  of  helpless  mankind — fear, 

^  Cowper  was  apparently  disturbed  by  the  views  of  men  like 
Richardson,  who  was,  in  his  estimation,  not  making  sufficient 
allowance  for  faith.  See  An  Ode  (on  reading  Mr.  Richardson's 
History  of  Sir  Charles  Grandison.) 


130  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

despair,  ambition,  guilt,  avarice — and  has  shown  how 
famished  infants  die  in  the  sight  of  Avarice.  If  man 
must  bear  the  reign  of  these  plagues,  he  had  better  never 
have  been  created. 

Say,  will  Religion  clear  this  gloom, 
And  point  to  bliss  beyond  the  tomb ! 
Yes,  haply  for  her  chosen  train ; 
The  rest,  they  say,  severe  decrees  ordain 
To  realms  of  endless  night  and  everlasting  pain ! 

Where  Cowper's  extended  and  faithful  transcription  from 
cottage  life  makes  a  sure  appeal  for  a  consideration  of  the 
children  of  the  poor,  but  at  the  same  time  does  not  go  beyond 
the  symptoms  of  poverty,  the  benevolists,  by  striking  at  fun- 
damental causes,  go  to  the  root  of  the  evils  of  poverty,  and 
wish  to  remedy  conditions  that  cause  poverty.  Cowper  has 
visualized  cottage  children  with  knees  together  before  the 
scanty  fire,  but  he  has  not  recognized  the  odds  against  the 
cottager  in  the  surrounding  circumstances  for  which  he  can 
not  be  held  responsible.  ^ 

The  feeling  heart  of  Burns  responded  sympathetically  to 
the  sufferings  of  the  poor.  The  Ruined  Farmer  (1777)  rep- 
resents his  father  at  Mount  Oliphant.  It  is  evident  from 
Burns's  autobiography  that  the  farm  had  proved  a  ruinous 

1  Wordsworth  seems  to  recognize  a  difference  between  the 
teaching  of  the  Church  and  that  of  Nature.  In  the  first  book  of 
The  Excursion  he  tells  how  the  "Scottish  Church"  had  held  (with 
a  "strong  hand  of  purity")  the  Wanderer  and  those  "With  whom 
from  childhood  he  grew  up."  But  whatever  the  Wanderer  had  im- 
bibed of  "fear  or  darker  thought,"  the  "native  vigour  of  his  mind" 
had  "melted  all  away": 

Sometimes  his  religion  seemed  to  me 
Self-taught,  as  of  a  dreamer  in  the  woods; 
Who  to  the  model  of  his  own  pure  heart 
Shaped  his  belief,  as  grace  divine  inspired, 
And  human  reason  dictated  with  awe. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  131 

bargain:  ''My  father  was  advanced  in  life  when  he  married. 
I  was  the  eldest  of  seven  children,  and  he,  worn  out  by 
early  hardship,  was  unfit  for  labor.  My  father's  spirit  was 
soon  irritated,  but  not  easily  broken.  There  was  a  freedom 
in  his  lease  in  two  years  more ;  and  to  weather  these  two 
years  we  retrenched  expenses." 

The  poem  is  conceived  as  a  meditation.  "The  sun  is 
sunk  in  the  West."  His  father  is  sore  beset  with  sorrow 
and  grief  over  his  poverty,  which  awakens  thoughts  of  mis- 
ery while  he  sits  by  the  fire  and  listens  to  the  tempests  that 
blow  about  the  cottage.  Not  long  ago  he  had  been  in  a  posi- 
tion to  relieve  distress;  but  now  he  can  with  difficulty  earn 
enough  to  support  his  wife  and  children.  He  looks  upon 
his  sleeping  wife,  whose  cares  are  for  a  moment  at  rest.  He 
is  in  despair  over  having  brought  her  so  low. 

There  lie  my  sweet  babies  in  her  arms ; 

No  anxious  fear  their  little  hearts  alarms; 

But  for  their  sake  my  heart  does  ache, 
With  many  a  bitter  throe. 

He  is  embittered  to  the  verge  of  welcoming  the  grave  as  a 
refuge  from  the  ills  of  fortune.  The  thought  of  their  de- 
pendence arouses  his  manlier  self: 

But  then  my  wife  and  children  dear — 
O  whither  would  they  go! 

Although  he  does  not  know  which  way  to  turn,  "All  friend- 
less, forsaken,  and  forlorn,"  he  must  endure.  Although 
there  can  be  no  rest  or  peace,  the  mute  appeal  of  his  chil- 
dren stirs  the  father  heart  in  him,  and  he  takes  new  courage 
to  face  the  morrow. 

In  The  Cotter's  Satitrday-Xight  (1785)  Burns  indirectly 
attacks  luxury  and  the  haughty  lordling's  pride  by  doing  his 
best  to  paint  an  appealing  picture  of  the  simple  life  of  the 
cotter.  Fundamentally  the  poem  is  motivated  by  Burns's 
contempt  for  lords.     City  and  country  life  are  contrasted  in 


132  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

the  thought  that  the  poet's  friend  Aiken,  even  though  his 
worth  had  not  become  known,  would  have  been  happier  in  a 
cottage.  In  order  to  scale  down  **the  lordling's  pomp,"  he 
portrays  "The  native  feelings  strong,  and  guileless  ways" 
of  an  honest  toiler  and  his  family,  who  represent  sturdy 
democratic  virtues.  Although  Burns  succeeds  in  empha- 
sizing idylHc  elements  while  he  sings  "The  lowly  train  in 
life's  sequester'd  scene,"  they  have  not  altogether  crowded 
out  harsher  facts  that  throw  light  on  the  hardships  and  pri- 
vations of  the  cotter  and  his  family. 

The  chill  November  wind  blows  as  the  toil-worn  cotter, 
his  ''weekly  moil  at  end,"  plods  across  the  moor.  As  he 
comes  in  sight  of  his  cot,  his  younger  children, 

Th'  expectant  wee-things,  toddlin,  stacher  through 

To  meet  their  "dad,"  wi'   flichterin'  noise  and  glee. 

He  is  cheered  by  his  thrifty  wife's  smile,  and  sits  before  the 
'Svee  bit  ingle,  blinkin  bonilie." 

The  lisping  infant,  prattling  on  his  knee. 

Does  a'  his  weary  kiaiigh  and  care  beguile, 
And    makes    him    quite    forget    his    labor    and    his    toil,  i 
Belyve,  the  elder  bairns  come  drapping  in, 

At  service  out,  amang  the  farmers  roun'; 
Some  ca'  the  pleugh,  some  herd,  some  tentie  rin 

A  cannie  errand  to  a  neibor  town : 

Their  eldest  hope,  their  Jenny,  woman-grown, 
In  youthfu'  bloom — love  sparkling  in  her  e'e — 

Comes  hame ;   perhaps,  to  shew  a  braw  new  gown, 
Or  deposite  her  sair-won  penny  fee, 
To  help  her  parents  dear,  if  they  in  hardship  be. 

^  Compare  The  Poor  Man's  Prayer  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Roberts  of 
Eton : 

While  I,   contented  with  my  homely  cheer, 
Saw  round  my  knees  my  prattling  children  play ; 
And  oft  with  pressed  attention  sat  to  hear 
The  little  history  of  their  idle  day. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  rOOR  133 

Time  passes  swift-winged  until  a  strapping  lad  who 
calls  on  Jenny  is  received  by  her  parents.  They  are  happy 
in  the  thought  that  their  ''bairn's  respected  like  the  lave." 
Then  the  cottager's  simple  fare  is  set  out  for  supper.  It 
consists  of  wholesome  porridge,  "chief  of  Scotia's  food," 
and  milk  from  their  only  cow  which  is  chewing  the  cud 
beyond  the  kitchen  wall.  As  a  special  treat  the  mother 
brjngs  out  from  her  storeroom  a  ripe  cheese  she  had  treas- 
ured for  such  an  occasion.  After  this  frugal  supper  the 
family  form  a  wide  circle  before  the  ingle,  and  with  serious 
mien  listen  to  the  father,  who  with  patriarchal  simplicity 
reads  from  the  ''big  ha'-bible."  They  sing  hymns  com- 
pared with  which  "Italian  trills  are  tame." 

Then  homeward  all  take  off  their  sev'ral  way; 

The  youngling  cottagers  retire  to  rest : 
The  parent-pair  their  secret  homage  pay, 

And  proffer  up  to  Heaven  the  warm  request, 

That  He  who  stills  the  raven's  clam'rous  nest, 
And  decks  the  lily  fair  in  flow'ry  pride, 

Would,  in  the  way  His  wisdom  sees  the  best, 
For  them  and  for  their  little  ones  provide; 
But    chiefly,    in    their    hearts    with    grace    divine    preside. 

Although  the  children  are  happy  and  their  parents  thrifty, 
the  veil  of  sentiment  does  not  altogether  obscure  the  harsher 
facts  of  the  cotter's  anxiety  and  the  not  too  remote  con- 
tingency of  hardship  against  which  Jenny  deposits  her 
sorely-won  penny.  The  emphasis  is  not  on  social  or  econo- 
mic conditions  of  the  Scotch  cotter,  but  on  his  sturdy  hon- 
esty and  God-fearing  qualities.  Even  these,  Burns  fears, 
are  endangered  by  new  conditions  which,  "From  luxury's 
contagion,  weak  and  vile,"  threaten  to  infect  the  "hardy 
sons  of  rustic  toil"  who  make  Scotland  "lov'd  at  home, 
rever'd  abroad." 


134  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Althoug-h  idyllic  in  his  treatment,  Burns  is  not  blind, 
even  in  this  poem,  to  the  distressful  poverty  of  cottagers. 
Several  poems  indicate  that  he  is  a  son  of  the  Revolution. 
His  fiery  attacks  on  class  privilege  are  conceived  in  the 
mood  of  Thomas  Paine's  Rights  of  Man.  In  Tzi'a  Dogs 
(1786)  he  mercilessly  holds  up  the  vices  of  the  ruling  classes, 
and  swells  the  chorus  of  condemnation  directed  against 
petty  officials.  The  unfortunate  poor  must  endure  meekly 
the  abuses  of  a  gesturing,  cursing  factor  who  threatens  to 
distrain  their  effects.  In  the  language  of  the  dog  Caesar, 
the  gentry  care  as  little  for  delvers,  ditchers,  '*an'  sic  cattle," 
as  he  does  for  a  soiled  badger.  'In  Man  was  made  to  Mourn 
(1784)  Burns  protests  against  the  sacrifices  of  the  poor 
man  who  labors  to  support  "a  haughty  lordling's  pride." 
A  manuscript  variant  makes  the  accusation  specific.  On 
a  cold  November  evening  the  poet  meets  a  toil-worn  old  man. 
In  the  course  of  protests  against  conditions  that  oppress 
this  man,  Burns  calls  attention  to  the  overworked  laborer 
who  finds  it  necessary  to  beg  a  brother  man  to  give  him 
leave  to  toil, 

And   see   his   lordly   fellow-worm 

The  poor  petition  spurn, 
Unmindful,  tho'  a  weeping  wife 

And  helpless  offspring  mourn. 

Burns  was  himself  oppressed  by  anxiety  over  his  chil- 
dren. In  a  letter  to  Mrs.  Dunlop  (1793)  he  quotes  the 
opening  stanza  and  the  chorus  of  "an  old  Scots  ballad,"  and 
comments  on  his  own  poverty. 

O  that  I  had  ne'er  been  married. 

I  wad  never  had  nae  care, 
Now  I've  gotten  wife  an'  weans, 

An'   they   cry   "crowdie"    (food)    evermair. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  IX)OR  135 

Ance  crowdie,  twice  crowdie, 

Three  times  crowdie  in  a  day; 
Gin  ye  "crowdie"  any  mair, 

Ye'll  crowdie  a'  my  meal  away. 

"I  see  a  train  of  helpless  little  folks — ^ine  and  my  exertions 
all  their  stay.  ...  If  I  am  nipt  ofif  at  the  command  of 
fate,  even  in  all  the  vigor  of  manhood.  .  .  .  Gracious 
God!   .    .    .   what  would  become  of  my  little  flock?" 

The  Address  to  Beelzebub  (1786)  definitely  suggests  the 
biting  sarcasm  and  vitriolic  attacks  of  Paine.  Burns  ironi- 
cally commends  the  Earl  of  Breadalbane's  endeavors  to 
frustrate  the  attempt  of  five  hundred  highlanders  to  escape 
to  Canada  from  their  lawful  masters,  "whose  property  they 
are."  They  were  living  in  abject  poverty  and  squalor,  and 
wished  to  better  their  condition.  Burns  ironically  urges  the 
Earl's  agents  to  activity,  and  notices  the  degraded  state  of 
children  who  suffer  with  their  elders.  He  mockingly  invites 
the  Earl  to  visit  his  cottage,  where  Burns  will  dignify  him 
by  seating  him  at  the  ingle-side  **  'Tween  Herod's  hip  an' 
Polycrate,"  a  seat  which,  the  poet  observes,  he  well  deserves. 
The  language  of  Burns  is  as  unsparing  as  that  of  Paine,  and 
as  harsh  as  the  lines  of  Hogarth  when  he  pictures  the  squalor 
and  rags  of  London  brats  in  Gin  Lane.  If  the  Earl  does  not 
wish  his  people  to  keep  their  native  Highland  spirit,  he 
should  have  his  agents  "smash  them"  into  chips,  or  let  the 
bankrupts  rot  in  the  jails.     As  for  the  children: 

The    young    dogs,    swinge    them    to    the    labor ; 
Let  wark  an'  hunger  mak  them  sober ! 

And  for  the  girls  he  advises,  in  the  cynical  mood  of  their 
superiors,  that  if  they  are  seemly  they  should  be  sent  to 
Drury  Lane  to  be  lessoned. 


136  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

An'  if  the  wives  an'  dirty  brats 
Come  thiggin  at  your  doors  an'  3'etts, 
Flafiin  wi'  duds,  and  grey  wi'  beas, 
Frighten  away  your  ducks  an'  geese ; 
Get  out  a  horsewhip  or  a  jowler, 
The    langest    thong,    the    fiercest    growler, 
An'  gar  the  tattered  gypsies  pack 
Wi'  a'  their  bastards  on  their  back ! 

The  gentle  protest  of  the  sentimentalists  here  takes  on  the 
fire  of  those  who  like  Paine  protested  with  colloquial  vigor 
in  the  spirit  of  the  Revolution. 

Among  the  poets  before  1800,  Southey  had  most  fully 
awakened  to  the  suffering  brought  upon  children  by  war. 
Southey  does  not  see  the  glamour  of  war.  His  heart  suf- 
fers with  the  innocent  victims  in  cottage  homes.  Extended 
development  is  found  in  The  Soldier's  Wife  (1795),  in 
which  he  catches  up  the  war  motive  to  give  it  independent 
treatment  in  a  full-length  group  portrait  of  the  widow  and 
her  children.  She  is  wearily  trudging  along  the  highway 
with  her  children. 

Sorely  thy  little  one  drags  by  thee  barefooted ; 
Cold  is  the  baby  that  hangs  at  thy  bending  back, 
Meagre  and  livid,  and  screaming  for  misery. 

Woe-begone  mother,  half  anger,  half  agony. 

As  over  thy  shoulder  thou  look'st  to  hush  the  babe. 

Bleakly  the  blinding  snow  beats  in  thy  haggard  face.  ^ 

Ne'er  will  thy  husband  return  from  the  war  again; 
Cold  is  thy  heart,  and  as  frozen  as  Charity ; 
Cold  are  thy  children, — Now  God  be  thy  comforter ! 

Southey's  Victory  (1798)  contrasts  with  the  nation's 
wild  rejoicing  over  a  naval  victory  the  sadness  of  the  home 
which  has  lost  a  sailor  father  who  had  been  forced  by 
lawful  violence 

1  Coleridge  composed  the  second  stanza. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE   POOR  137 

From  his   own   home   and   wife   and   little   ones, 
Who  by  his  labor  lived ;  that  he  was  one 
Whose  uncorrupted  heart  could  keenly   feel 
A  husband's  love,  a  father's  anxiousness ; 
That  from  the  wages  of  his  toil  he  fed 
The  distant  dear  ones,  and  would  talk  of  them 
At  midnight  when  he  trod  the  silent  deck 
With  him  he  valued, — talk  of  them,  of  joys 
Which  he  had  known, — O  God!  and  of  the  hour 
When  they  should  meet  again.   .    .    . 

Man  does  not  know  what  a  cold  sickness  chilled  the  widow's 
blood  when  she  heard  tidings  of  the  sea  fight ;  nor  does 
man  know  with  what  dread  she  listened  to  the  names  of 
those  who  died : 

Man    does    not    know,    or,    knowing    will    not    heed. 

With  what  an  agony  of  tenderness 

She  gazed  upon  her  children,  and  beheld 

His  image  who  was  gone. 

Southey  is  not  merely  writing  about  war,  but  endeavors  to 
realize  concretely  the  eflfects  of  war  in  the  cottage  home. 
Instead  of  merely  referring  to  the  widow,  he  attempts  to 
analyze  her  emotions  as  stirred  by  her  children.  Imagina- 
tive presentation  has  taken  the  place  of  incidental  reference. 
The  thought  of  children  as  the  "image"  of  their  parent  has 
been  taken  from  its  conventional  setting  in  complimentary 
verse,  and  has  been  made  an  emotional  force  in  an  already 
tense  situation.  ^ 

^  Complaints  of  the  Poor  (1798)  depicts  a  soldier's  wife,  seated 
by  the  roadside,  with  a  baby  at  her  back  and  an  infant  at  her  breast. 
The  Soldier's  Funeral  (1795)  combines  the  orphan,  mother,  and  love 
of  home  motives.  Compare  also  Southey's  Humphrey  and  William 
(1794),  and  Wordsworth's  lines  on  Margaret  in  Book  I  of  The 
Excursion. 

Southey  notices  childhood  in  his  Sonnets  (1794)  on  the  slave 
trade,  and  in  the  poem  To  the  Genius  of  Africa  (1795)  ;  and  Hannah 
More  has  piercing  lines  in  The  Black  Slave  Trade. 


138  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Southey's  deep  humanitarian  concern  over  the  injustice 
which  man  has  done  to  man  through  war  finds  classical 
expression  in  The  Battle  of  Blenheim  (1805).  It  is  the 
finest  flowering  of  the  war  motive  in  the  treatment  of  child- 
hood. With  imaginative  realization  he  combines  an  ob- 
jectivity that  makes  the  children  and  their  grandfather  real 
human  beings.  It  was  a  master-stroke  to  take  Peterkin  and 
Wilhelmine  at  evening  play  near  the  cottage  of  their  grand- 
father Kaspar  on  the  battlefield  of  Blenheim,  and  to  record 
their  unconscious  protest  against  warfare.  At  last,  after  a 
century  of  incidental  notice  of  the  widow  and  her  orphans, 
children  have  emerged  to  protest  in  their  innocent  childlike 
manner  against  the  makers  of  war.  By  an  objective  reali- 
zation of  the  predicament  in  which  Kaspar  finds  himself 
after  the  naive  questioning  of  the  children,  who  do  not 
understand  the  abstract  "greatness"  of  a  general  like  Prince 
Eugene  but  who  insist  on  the  fundamental  "why,"  Southey 
has  brought  home  his  point.  In  true  child  spirit,  Peterkin 
and  Wilhelmine,  who  are  unconscious  of  the  full  significance 
of  their  questions,  solve  the  problem  with  a  finality  that  is 
not  possible  in  the  argumentative  attack.  Southey  was  not 
toying  with  his  subject.  That  his  interest  in  the  situation 
is  not  merely  literary  is  clear  in  the  light  of  the  deep  humani- 
tarian interest  he  displayed  on  the  subject  of  war,  especially 
in  Victory.  This  poem  'is  closest  to  The  Battle  of  Blenheim 
in  its  insistence  on  the  hollowness  of  popular  acclaim  in  the 
face  of  destitute  children  who  must  pay  with  their  suflfermgs 
in  the  miseries  of  privation. 

Ill 

The  problem  of  charity  in  relation  to  childhood  became 
increasingly  acute  because  of  the  growth  of  industrial  cen- 
ters  which,   with  the   congestion   of   population,   presented 


CHILDRKN   OF  THK   R)OR  139 

new  problems  that  men  had  not  faced  even  in  London.  The 
center  of  gravity  in  Eni^lish  life  was  shifting  to  the  cities, 
so  that  there  was  increasing  danger  that  poets,  who  felt  an 
instinctive  antagonism  toward  city  Hfe,  would  lose  touch 
with  affairs.  Yet  long  before  industry  became  centered  in 
cities,  it  had  been  carried  on  in  households  throughout 
Britain.  The  development  was  from  home  industry  to 
factory  industry ;  and  long  before  children  were  employed  in 
factories,  they  had  worked  on  loom  and  wheel  in  the  home. 
From  Gay  to  Wordsworth,  poets  have  noticed  the  spinning 
industry  as  it  was  carried  on  in  cottages.  Although  chil- 
dren are  not  always  specifically  mentioned  in  this  connection, 
numerous  allusions  indicate  that  the  practice  of  employing 
cottage  children   was  universal   in   the  eighteenth   century. 

The  epic  of  English  commercial  supremacy  in  the  eigh- 
teenth century  is  interwoven  with  the  didactic  lines  of  John 
Dyer's  The  Fleece  (1757),  which  gives  rules  for  the  care  of 
sheep,  to  be  sure,  but  at  the  same  time  broadens  out  into  a 
consideration  of  the  foundations  of  English  commerce. 
It  is  significant  for  this  study  that  Dyer  incidentally  notices 
the  problem  of  children  in  their  relation  to  the  flourishing 
spinning  industry. 

He  is  proud  of  Albion's  greatness,  but  while  contemplat- 
ing her  success  does  not  ignore  hardship  and  suffering, 
which  were  on  the  increase.  In  his  endeavor  to  accentuate 
the  practical  value  of  his  program,  Dyer  paints  a  rosy  pic- 
ture of  smiling  countrysides,  and  glories  in  the  prosperity 
of  magnificent  seaports  crowded  with  forests  of  masts. 
In  the  course  of  his  discussion  of  flourishing  city  communi- 
ties he  calls  the  roll  of  industrial  centers  which  are  familiar 
enough  now,  but  which  were  new  in  his  day,  such  as 
Leeds,  Manchester,  Birmingham,  Sheffield,  and  "merchan- 
dising Hull."     He  has  his  eye  on   the  economic  trend  of 


140  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

events  when  he  records  that  country  people  are  crowding 
into  cities  in  search  of  ''tardy-rising  wealth."  Dyer  sees 
facts  from  the  point  of  view  of  one  who  is  interested  in  so- 
cial reconstruction/ 

The  Fleece  is  motivated  by  a  desire  to  increase  the  hap- 
piness of  English  people  through  the  salvation  that  comes 
from  industrious  labor.  Dyer  sees  intemperance,  the  foe 
of  labor,  at  his  dastardly  business  of  deluding  ignorant  work- 
ers into  leaving  honest  industry,  with  consequent  poverty 
and  suffering.  As  he  rises  to  a  climax  in  a  passage  on  the 
malicious  workings  of  this  eighteenth-century  bolshevik,  he 
notices  the  suffering  unjustly  entailed  on  children.  As  a 
matter  of  fact,  thirty  years  before  Crabbe,  though  not  to 
the  same  extent,  Dyer  called  attention  to  the  problem  of 
filth  and  squalor  in  cottage  homes : 

cease 
The  loom  and  shuttle  in  their  troubled  streets; 
Their  motion  stopped  by  wild  Intemperance, 
Toil's  suffering  foe,  who  lures  the  giddy  rout 
To  scorn  their  task-work,  and  to  vagrant  life 
Turns  their  rude  steps;   while   Misery,  among 
The   cries   of  infants,   haunts   their   mouldering   huts. 

His  enthusiasm  is  all  for  the  "felicities  of  labor."  He 
would  stimulate  activity  until  the  "sounding  loom"  mixes 
with  the  ''melody  of  every  vale."  If  the  worth  and  content- 
ment that  go  with  honest  toil  were  recognized,  the  sun  would 
shine   in  every  cottage  home.     The   weaver's   shuttle   is   a 

'  In  Agriculture  Dodsley  sees  only  the  "ruddy  maid"  whose 
"dexterous  hand"  twirls  her  wheel;  and  Cowper,  although  noticing 
the  spinner's  "scanty  pittance,"  prefers  to  find  ideal  contentment 
and  rural  felicity  in  her  heart,  which  is  as  light  as  her  purse. 
Where  Scott  and  Cowper  are  conservative  or  tend  toward  idyllic  in- 
sistence on  the  happiness  of  the  cottage  spinner  who  "jocund  chants 
her  lay"  while  "whirling"  her  "circling  wheel"  beside  the  cottage 
door,  Dyer  does  not  ignore  harsh  realities. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  1K)<)K  141 

''flowering  shuttle,"  and  cities  are  "glad  cities  of  the  loom." 
Not  content,  like  Scott  and  Cowper,  to  stop  with  idyllic 
glimpses  that  ignore  the  shade  for  the  sunshine,  and  not 
moved,  like  the  benevolists,  merely  to  cry  out  against  man 
for  the  injustice  which  especially  in  that  age  he  has  done 
to  his  fellow  man,  and  not  satisfied  to  give  only  his  sympa- 
thy to  poor  cottagers.  Dyer  offers  constructive  suggestions 
for  the  betterment  of  conditions.  He  does  not  stop  with 
charity  that  ignores  the  causes  of  misery,  but  he  points  the 
way  to  a  solution  that  will  remove  those  causes. 

His  directions  for  the  ambitious  youth  who  would  ac- 
quire a  loom  are  specific.  When  the  machine  has  been  in- 
stalled, the  industrious  youth  lays  in  a  store  of  soft  yarn. 
He  smooths  the  threads  of  the  warp  by  stringing  them 
along  the  garden  walk.  Then  he  sits  down  to  his  w^ork  and 
guides  the  "thready  shuttle"  skilfully  as  it  glides  from  hand 
to  hand.  Various  kinds  of  weaving  are  explained.  There 
is  a  realistic  description  of  a  "noisy  fulling-mill,"  and  an 
equally  detailed  picture  of  activities  at  the  dyeing  vats. 
Dyer  is  far  ahead  of  contemporary  men  of  letters  in  his 
appreciation  of  the  poetic  possibilities  of  machinery,  the 
enthusiasm  for  which  leads  him  to  a  belief  in  its  efiicacy  as 
an  agent  of  social  uplift.  ^ 

When  Dyer  considers  the  charitable  aspects  of  organized 
industrial  activities  of  the  poor,  he  offers  the  workhouse 
as  a  remedy.  He  would  have  the  nomadic  poor  find  a 
"house  of  toil"  in  every  parish,  where  unwilling  hands 
would  be  taught  the  art  of  avooI  combing,  carding,  and 
spinning.     His  description  of   institutional   activities   is   so 

1  Dr.  Henage  Dering,  Dean  of  Ripon,  in  a  topographical  poem 
Reliquiae  Eboracenses  (before  1750)  had  portrayed  in  Latin  hexa- 
meters the  activities  of  Roman  artisans  who  fabricated  arms  and 
weapons  at  Sheffield  where  "A  thousand  hearths  at  once  intensely 
glow." 


142  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Optimistic  that  one  fails  to  recognize  the  workhouses  which, 
dating  from  "EHza's"  reign,  were  hateful  to  an  independent, 
Hberty-loving  people,  however  poor.  Although  the  refer- 
ence to  Queen  Elizabeth  would  seem  to  indicate  the  tradi- 
tional workhouse,  it  is  sometimes  difficult  to  know  whether 
he  has  in  mind  the  newer  type  of  workhouse  called  the 
House  of  Industry,  which  was  in  existence  in  1757,  or 
whether  he  is  in  reality  thinking  of  the  traditional  institu- 
tion and  writing  of  it  in  the  more  attractive  terms  of  the 
House  of  Industry. 

Before  proceeding  to  a  glowing  account  of  an  English 
establishment,  Dyer  persuasively  calls  attention  to  the  happy 
contentment  and  useful  lives  of  the  inmates  of  a  Belgian 
workhouse.  In  assorting  the  different  grades  of  wool  that 
grow  on  a  single  fleece,  the  Belgians  excel  all  nations. 
Why  can  not  England,  with  a  superior  quality  of  fleece, 
excel  the  Belgians?  The  moral  of  the  example  is  that 
children  are  able  to  perform  the  delicate  task,  and  ought 
therefore  to  be  employed  as  they  are  in  Belgium.     He  sees 

e'en  childhood  there 
Its  little  fingers  turning  to  the  toil 
Delighted :  nimbly,  with  habitual  speed, 
They   sever   lock   from   lock ;    and   long   from   short, 
And  soft  and  rigid,  pile  in  several  heaps. 

When,  later,  he  turns  to  a  "spacious  dome"  in  England,  he 
chooses  a  workhouse  in  the  vale  of  Calder  near  Halifax. 
His  vocabulary  reflects  his  propagandist  mood:  "fair  pur- 
pose," "gracious  air,"  "gentle  steps,"  "silent  joy,"  "blithe," 
"sprightly  scene,"  "delightful  mansion."  Although  he  in- 
sists on  writing  in  a  cheerful  mood,  underneath  his  optimism, 
which  is  not  superficial  or  insincere,  is  felt  the  force  of  direct 
observation  and  first-hand  acquaintance.  He  has  seen 
children  at  work  in  these  houses  of  charity. 


childrilN  of  Tin-:  poor  143 

The  younger  hands 
Ply  at  the  easy  work  of  winding  yarn 
On  swiftly  circling  engines,  and  their  notes 
Warble  together,  as  a  choir  of  larks; 
Such  joy  arises  in  the  mind  employed. 

This  is  probably  the  earliest  notice  of  children  at  work  on 
machinery  outside  the  cottage  home.  Dyer's  optimism  is 
inspired  by  the  novelty  and  wonder  that  come  with  the 
new  direction  of  man's  activities  in  group  employment. 
Under  the  conditions  which  he  observed  in  workhouses, 
children  were  still  under  the  supervision  of  parents  or  at 
least  of  friends  who  lived  with  them  in  the  daily  routine  of 
the  establishment.  Abuse  of  child  labor  came  when  chil- 
dren were  taken  out  of  the  home  to  the  factory,  where  fore- 
men or  watchers,  who  were  interested  only  in  amount  of  out- 
put, lield  them  mercilessly  to  continuous  activity  during  long 
hours  of  toil.  As  a  result  Dyer  does  not  treat  childhood  as 
offering  a  separate  problem :  children  are  grouped,  as  he 
had  observed  them,  with  their  elders. 

About  the  time  The  Fleece  was  published,  children  were 
beginning  to  be  segregated  in  Houses  of  Industry.  As  the 
traditional  workhouses  were  farmed  out  to  the  lowest  bid- 
der, their  management  was  bad.  'Little  was  being  done  to 
educate  children  who  were  inmates.  Charitable  individuals, 
and  especially  justices  who  faced  deplorable  conditions  in 
the  routine  of  office,  were  more  and  more  alive  to  the 
evils  of  poverty.  They  also  became  increasingly  aware  of 
the  inefficiency  of  traditional  methods  of  poor  relief,  which 
did  not  strike  at  the  root  of  the  evil.  As  the  problem  was 
studied  by  enlightened  men  and  women,  the  necessity  of 
educating  children  to  habits  of  neatness  and  industry  be- 
came evident.  These  reformers  were  in  fact  working  in  the 
spirit  of  Dyer's  Fleece.  To  supplement  the  efforts  of  the 
workhouse,  and  with  the  aim  of  ultimately  doing  away  with 


144  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

it  altogether,  Houses  of  Industry  were  erected  by  means  of 
individual  contributions  and  assessments  on  the  poor  rates. 
Wordsworth  condemned  their  efforts  in  capital  letters  by 
referring  to  these  houses  as  "misnamed  HOUSES  of  IN- 
DUSTRY." But  in  Dyer's  day  they  represented  the  most 
enlightened  sentiment  of  charitable  men  and  women.  Many 
such  houses  were  built  in  the  sixties.  And  as  they  were  in 
existence  in  Lincolnshire  before  Dyer  published  The  Fleece, 
he  may  have  had  in  mind  one  of  these  newer  ventures  in 
the  relief  of  poverty.  The  same  enthusiasm  that  prompted 
his  fervid  lines  was  felt  by  the  founders  of  the  new  estab- 
lishments. ^ 

In  these  efforts  to  ameHorate  social  conditions  through 
the  education  of  children  to  habits  befitting  their  humble 
station,  the  workhouse  system  was  extended  and  modern- 
ized to  meet  the  needs  of  children.  The  arguments  em- 
ployed by  Dyer  were  used  repeatedly  in  favor  of  the  house 
of  industry  for  fifty  years  after  the  Fleece.-  The  differences 
are  those  of  emphasis.  Later  writers  of  pamphlets,  al- 
though envisaging  the  problem  as  a  whole,  were  especially 
concerned  with  childhood. 

Goldsmith's  The  Deserted  Village,  which  appeared  thir- 
teen years  after  The  Fleece,  develops  sentimentally  the 
theme  of  the  evils  of  luxury  as  reflected  in  unjust  oppres- 
sion of  the  poor.  Goldsmith  sees  the  evil  effects  of  en- 
closures of  land  to  form  new  estates  or  to  extend  the  old. 
As  in  sweet  Auburn,  familiar  landmarks  were  often  ruth- 
lessly razed  merely  to  make  way  for  a  prospect.^  His  at- 
tack on  the  misuse  of  wealth  is  veiled  by  the  sentiment  which 
1  Sarah  Trimmer,  Oeconomy  of  Charity,  1787- 1801  (edition 
1801),  and  Thomas   Ruggles,   History  of  the  Poor    (edition   I794)- 

-  Dyer  and  later  writers  may  have  been  indebted  to  Locke's 
scheme  of  "Working  Schools." 

3  Compare  Mackenzie's  The  Man  of  Feeling. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  145 

colors  his  reminiscent  pictures  of  happy  village  life  under  old 
conditions.  This  weakens  the  force  of  the  poem  for  social 
reform.  From  the  time  of  its  publication,  readers  have 
overlooked,  in  favor  of  the  delightful  reminiscence  of  a 
happy  village  life,  the  terrible  social  injustice  which  the 
IX)et  recogrkizes  as  an  historical  fact.' 

Although  the  misuse  of  power  over  helpless  cottagers 
is  not  blinked.  Goldsmith  is  careful  to  choose  imagery  that 
will  not  offend ;  harsh  reality,  where  it  threatens  to  break 
through,  is  prettily  sentimentalized.  The  literary  efifect  of 
the  poem  is  accentuated  by  the  fact  that  the  reader  is  al- 
lowed to  look  upon  village  woes  only  as  transmuted  by  the 
personality  of  the  poet,  who  is  kept  in  the  foreground,  and 
with  whose  personal  woes  the  reader  is  made  to  sympathize. 
Goldsmith  allows  the  reader  to  see  only  a  happy  childhood. 
He  is  sad,  but  the  imagery  drawn  from  childhood  is  pleas- 
ing. Children  are  at  play  on  the  green ;  they  pluck  affec- 
tionately at  the  gown  of  the  village  preacher ;  they  laugh 
at  the  jokes  and  fear  the  frowns  of  the  village  schoolmaster. 
The  poet's  melting  mood  of  unhappiness  may  sadden  his 
recollection  of  childhood  delights  that  can  no  longer  be 
observed  in  villages  which  have  been  blotted  from  the 
landscape  by  a  wealthy  landowner ;  but  the  poetic  sadness 
is  not  vigorous  enough  to  counterbalance  the  idyllic  mood 
in  which  the  images  of  childhood  are  conceived. 

In  his  choice  of  theme,  if  not  in  its  development.  Gold- 
smith does  bear  witness  to  the  increased  hardship  suffered 
by  children  of  the  poor.-     If  the  poem  is  read  in  the  light 

'  For  a  fuller  account  of  this  phase  of  Tltc  Deserted  I'illage. 
see  The  English  Village,  by  Julia  Patton. 

-  The  Poor  Man's  Prayer  by  the  Rev.  Dr.  Roberts  of  Eton 
definitely  connects  the  suffering  of  cottagers  and  their  children  with 
the  "tyrant  lord"  who,  "armed  with  cruel  Law's  coercive  power," 
evicts  them. 


146  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

of  historical  events  which  justify  his  sadness,  the  forgotten 
Hnes,  which  are  not  idylHc,  take  on  a  new  significance. 

Another  poem,  which  was  published  thirteen  years  after 
The  Deserted  Village,  and  which  was  inspired  by  the  kind 
of  literary  glozing  found  in  Goldsmith's  poem,  supplies  the 
ugly  details  which  Goldsmith  pictured  only  indirectly,  and 
to  which  Dyer  referred  only  in  passing.  Crabbe's  The  Vil- 
lage (1783)  shows  the  facts  of  village  life  as  they  had 
appeared  only  incidentally  in  poetry.  Although  Scott  of 
Amwell  used  the  image  of  children  playing  with  toy  boats 
in  the  kennel's  dirty  tide,  he  belongs  with  Goldsmith  to  the 
school  of  poets  who  preferred  to  observe  the  pleasant  fea- 
tures of  village  life.  In  a  letter  to  Beattie,  Scott  is  queru- 
lous over  the  realism  of  Crabbe's  The  Village.  "The  au- 
thor of  "The  Village"  takes  the  dark  side  of  the  question : 
he  paints  all  with  a  sombre  pencil;  too  justly,  perhaps,  but, 
to  me  at  least,  unpleasingly.  We  know  there  is  no  unmixed 
happiness  in  any  state  of  life;  but  one  does  not  wish  to  be 
perpetually  told  so." 

Crabbe  is  able  to  amplify  the  brutal  facts  which  lie  at  the 
roots  of  Dyer's  problem ;  but  unlike  the  earlier  poet,  he  is 
negative  in  that  he  suggests  no  specific  remedy  for  social  ills. 
The  Village  merely  lays  bare  the  repulsive  conditions  he  ob- 
served in  his  boyhood  haunts  in  and  about  the  seaside 
village  of  Aldborough.  He  is  impatient  of  pastoralities. 
When  he  sees  the  mid-day  sun  beating  down  on  the  bare 
heads  of  harvesters,  he  does  not  hide  the  grim  realities  of 
toil  in  "tinsel  trappings."  He  will  paint  the  cottage  "as 
truth  will  paint  it,  and  as  bards  will  not."  Poverty  can 
not  soothe  the  poor  who  pine  for  bread.  Corydons  still 
complain  in  poetry,  but  only  of  the  pains  which  they  never 
feel.  In  the  grim  actualities  of  contemporary  life,  peasants 
have  had  to  leave  their  oaten  reeds  to  follow  the  plough  in 
a  niggardly  soil. 


CHILDREN  OF  TUK  POOR  147 

There    thistles    stretch    their    prickly    arms    afar, 
And  to  the  rugged  infant  threaten  war. 

Children  and  young  folk  do  not  play  at  rural  games  on  the 
green.  He  cannot  find  there  the  simple  life  of  nature:  "Ra- 
pine and  Wrong  and  Fear  usurped  her  place."  Crabbe  fled 
as  soon  as  he  could  from  his  native  Aldborough,  where 
"guilt  and  famine  reign."  There  nature  was  not  friendly 
to  man.     The  aged  worker  in  the  fields  looks  up  to  behold 

The  bare  arms  broken  from  the  withering  tree. 
On  which,  a  boy,  he  climbed  the  highest  bough. 
Then  his  first  joy,  but  his  sad  emblem  now. 

Let  him  who  dreams  of  rural  ease  and  picturesque  cottages, 
look  within  the  cottages  of  the  poor,  and  see  children  "round 
their  feeble  fire."  They  must  be  satisfied  with  a  "stinted 
meal."  Hardship  drives  many  to  poaching  for  food,  and 
liquor  causes  brawls  at  inns  where  the  father's  weekly  wage 
has  been  squandered.  The  drunken  husband  reels  home  to 
strike  his  "teeming  mate." 

Crabbe's  poetry  was  influential  in  rousing  people  to  the 
need  of  reform :  excerpts  from  The  Village  were  widely 
read  by  impressionable  children  in  "Elegant  Extracts"  and 
"Poetical  Extracts,"  which  were  used  in  the  schools.  Sir 
Walter  Scott  and  Wordsworth  were  profoundly  moved  by 
his  lines.  Wordsworth  wrote  to  Crabbe's  son :  "They  will 
last,  from  their  combined  merits  as  Poetry  and  Truth,  full 
as  long  as  anything  that  has  been  expressed  in  verse  since 
they  first  made  their  appearance."  Crabbe  is  not  writing  in 
the  mood  of  Dyer,  so  that  in  his  workhouse  the  cheerful  hum 
of  wheels  has  become  a  mournful  drone  to  the  accompani- 
ment of  which  there  can  be  no  voices  of  happy  children 
singing  like  larks.  Within  its  mud  walls,  and  in  the  putrid 
vapors  of  unventilated  rooms. 


148  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

There   children   dwell   who   know   no   parent's   care; 
Parents   who   know   no   children's    love,   dwell   there. 
Heart-broken  matrons  on  their  joyless  bed, 
Forsaken  wives,  and  mothers  never  wed; 
Dejected  widows  with  unheeded  tears, 
And  crippled  age  with  more  than  childhood  fears.  ^ 

In  The  Introduction  to  the  Parish  Register  (1807)  Crab- 
be  writes  with  greater  minuteness  and  detail  of  the  back- 
ground portrayed  in  a  general  way  in  The  Village.  As  he 
explores  the  annals  of  his  parish  poor,  he  fails  to  find 
records  that  suggest  happy  Eden  or  sweet  Auburn  in  the 
want  that  keeps  sunshine  from  the  cottage  gate.  In  the 
same  year  that  Wordsworth  published  the  Intimations  Ode, 
Crabbe  took  as  his  theme  the  vice  and  misery  of  the  "infected 
Row  we  term  our  street."  There  the  sot,  cheat,  and  shrew 
met  each  evening  to  dispute  and  riot ;  there  one  could  nightly 

hear 

the  curse,  the  cries 
Of  beaten  wife,  perverse  in  her  replies; 
While  shrieking  children  hold  each  threat'ning  hand, 
And  sometimes  life,  and  sometimes  food  demand : 
Boys,  in  their  first-stol'n  rags,  to  swear  begin. 
And  girls,  who  heed  not  dress,   are   skilled   in  gin. 

1  Compare  the  lines  in  The  Parish  Register : 

Back  to  their  homes  the  prudent  vestry  went, 

And  Richard  Monday  to  the  workhouse  sent. 

There  he  was  pinched  and  pitied,  thumped,  and  fed, 

And  duly  took  his  beatings  and  his  bread; 

Patient  in  all  control,  in  all  abuse. 

He  found  contempt  and  kicking  have  their  use: 

Sad,  silent,  supple;  bending  to  the  blow, 

A  slave  of  slaves,  the  lowest  of  the  low; 

* 

His  were  the  legs  that  ran  at  all  commands; 

They  used  on  all  occasions  Richard's  hands: 

His  very  soul  was  not  his  own.   .    .    . 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  149 

Amid  sweepings  from  the  door  lie  mingled  masses  of 
putrefying  matter,  into  which  sinks  "disembogue"  and 
through  which  kennels  flow. 

There  hungry  dogs  from  hungry  children  steal ; 
There  pigs  and  chickens  quarrel  for  a  meal ; 
There  dropsied  infants  wail  without  redress. 
And    all    is    want    and    wo    and    wretchedness. 

Crabbe  wonders  if  the  boys  with  bare  bodies  hardened  and 
bronzed  by  the  sun  will  "outlive  the  lack  of  care" ;  they  will, 
if  they  can  be  forced  to  work  on  a  farm.  More  degrading 
are  the  sleeping  quarters  where  the  beds  are  crowded  into 
a  single  room: 

Daughters    and    sons    to    yon    compartments    creep. 
And  parents  here  beside  their  children  sleep. 

Sanitation  is  not  known  in  such  hovels.  The  gentle  reader 
must  endure,  for  the  "true  physician  walks  the  foulest 
wards."  There  are  frowsy  patches  on  the  floor,  and  there 
is  downy  dust  beneath  the  window  and  round  the  posts  of 
the  bed  on  which  He  tattered  garments. 

See !   as   we  gaze,   an   infant   lifts   its   head, 
Left  by  neglect  and  burrowed  in  that  bed. 

In  1785  Cowper,  in  his  evangelical  fervor,  already  bore 
witness  to  drunken  brawls  that  disturbed  the  quiet  of  his 
country  retreat  on  the  banks  of  the  Ouse,  and  noticed  in 
The  Task  the  drunken  cottager  who  starved  his  children  by 
squandering  his  wage  at  the  village  inn.  In  1794  Blake's 
Songs  of  Experience  depicted  in  The  Little  Vagabond  a 
child  who  appeals  to  his  mother  by  protesting  that  the 
church  is  cold  but  that  the  ale-house  is  warm  and  cheerful.  \ 

1  The  liquor  problem  in  connection  with  incidental  notice  of 
childhood  has  been  frequently  noted  in  prose,  and  sometimes  in 
verse.  For  prose,  Defoe's  Colonel  Jacques  is  interesting.  For 
poetry,   in   addition   to  passages   already   noted,   there   are :    Edward 


150  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  eighties  saw  an  unparalleled  outburst  of  reform 
activities.  Hannah  More's  Sensibility  reveals  clearly  how 
sentimentalism  was  giving  way  to  more  practical  consider- 
ations that  are  implied  in  Crabbe's  willingness  to  see  con- 
ditions as  they  exist.  Sentimental  poems  and  plays,  and  the 
sentimental  attitude  toward  animals,  had  prepared  the  way 
for  practical  reforms  in  the  interests  of  children ;  but  merely 
literary  sentiment  is  no  longer  justified  in  the  face  of  man's 
realization  of  social  conditions  that  appeal  to  the  heart  for 
practical  reforms.  The  "graceful  drapery  Feeling  wears," 
no  longer  satisfies  the  longings  of  those  who  wish  to  be  of 
service  to  ill-conditioned  children.  Hannah  More  is  out  of 
patience  with  one 

Who   thinks   feigned    sorrows   all   her   tears   deserve, 
And  weeps  o'er  Werther  while  her  children  starve. 

Sarah  Trimmer  published  her  Occonomy  of  Charity  in 
its  first  form  in  1787.  Hannah  More's  Mendip  Annals, 
which  bears  witness  to  her  charitable  work  among  the 
wretched  cottagers  of  the  Cheddar  district,  dates  from  the 
same  period.  Ruggles's  History  of  the  Poor  reviews  con- 
ditions from  the  sixties  to  the  nineties  in  an  effort  to 
awaken  the  charitable  instincts  of  Englishmen.  It  is  not 
necessary  to  go  to  these  prose  sources  for  a  portrayal  of 
spiritual  neglect  that  stimulated  the  efforts  of  Raikes  and 
his  followers  in  the  Sunday  School  movement  in  the  eighth 
decade,  for  Crabbe's  fierce  light  had  been  focused  on  the 
abuses  of  the  church  in  1783.  Village  children  suspend 
their  games  to  view  the  funeral  of  their  aged  friend,  but  the 
mourners  wait  in  vain  until  evening  beside  the  grave.  The 
busy  priest  is  detained  by  weightier  matters,  and  the  poor 

Moore's  The  Oivl  and  the  Nightingale;  Mickle's  Syr  Martyn;  Mac- 
neill's  whiskey  ballad  Will  and  Jean;  and  the  early  A  dialog  Be- 
Hveen  a  Butcher  and  his  Wife,  after  his  return  from  the  Ale-House. 


CHILDREN  OF  THE  POOR  151 

man's  bones  lie  unblest.  Hannah  More  found  at  Cheddar 
that  the  cottagers  were  all  but  totally  neglected  by  the  es- 
tablished church.  Among  the  miners  and  glass  workers 
of  the  Mendips  she  and  her  sister  Patty  observed  children 
as  wretched  as  those  of  Aldborough. 

Raikes  had  to  meet  vigorous  opposition,  and  Hannah 
More  was  thwarted  at  every  turn  by  obstructionist  policies. 
In  the  welter  of  social  unrest  that  accompanied  the  Revolu- 
tion, conservative  or  reactionary  opinion  was  suspicious  of 
all  innovations.  Men  feared  that  the  efforts  of  most  chari- 
table organizations  were  somehow  bound  up  with  Revolu- 
tionary propaganda,  and  broadly  classified  them  as  part  and 
parcel  of  Revolutionary  activities.  It  was  feared  also  that 
Hannah  More's  plan  would  raise  children  above  their  natural 
social  level  and  make  them  unfit  as  hewers  of  wood  and 
drawers  of  water.  It  is  known,  for  instance,  from  her 
journals  and  other  sources,  that  some  reformers  doubted 
the  wisdom  of  teaching  children  even  to  read,  because  read- 
ing might  make  them  unfit  servants.  ^  Wordsworth,  who 
was  a  friend  of  children  always,  was  moved  in  1815  to 
protest  against  ''systems  which  cramped  childhood  and  held 
it  artificially  in  restraint  within  the  economic  barriers  set 
up  as  a  result  of  class  distinction."  It  is  easy  to  see  how 
his  rugged  mountain  nature,  bred  even  in  school  at  Hawkes- 
head  to  freedom  from  close  supervision,  was  temperamen- 
tally opposed  to  anything  short  of  an  equal  opportunity  for 
all  English  children. 

Wordsworth,  who  insisted  that  freedom  is  the  birthright 
of  children,  could  not  sympathize  with  a  system  that  took  the 
child  as  soon  as  the  mother  could  spare  him,  and  placed  him 

^  A  rich  Cheddar  farmer  assured  Hannah  More  that  religion 
would  be  the  ruin  of  agriculture,  although  he  conceded  that  religion 
might  be  a  good  thing  if  it  would  keep  children  from  robbing  or- 
chards.     {Mendip  Annals.) 


152  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

in  a  House  of  Industry.  Ruggles  notes  varying  ages  as 
low  as  three  years,  and  repeatedly  refers  to  children  of  five 
and  six  who  assisted  at  the  work  of  spinning.  It  must  be 
remembered  that  Dyer's  enthusiasm  for  the  employment  of 
children  meant  long  hours  from  six  in  the  morning  to 
seven  at  night  in  summer,  and  eight  in  winter.  A  school- 
mistress was  employed  to  supervise  the  youngest  children, 
and  a  master  to  teach  the  boys  for  an  hour  during  the  day. 
The  long  hours  of  supervised  routine  must  have  been  dead- 
ening in  their  influence  on  spontaneous  child  nature,  and 
the  aim  of  teaching  children  machine-like  habits  of  regular- 
ity was  no  doubt  realized.  The  only  variety  to  which  boys 
might  look  forward  was  seasonal  work  in  the  fields.  They 
were  able  to  drill  at  planting  time,  or  to  assist  at  harvest. 
One's  heart  prompts  the  wish  that  there  were  many  pre- 
datory wild  birds  near  houses  of  industry,  for  it  does  the 
heart  good  to  know  that  the  little  boys,  who  were  being  con- 
verted into  automatons,  were  hired  out  to  scare  birds  from 
the  newly-planted  fields  and  orchards.  What  a  relief  from 
dreary  routine  that  lasted  from  sunrise  to  sunset — and 
after!  In  Dyer's  time,  and  later  to  the  days  of  Lancaster 
and  Bell,  houses  of  industry  were,  nevertheless,  the  expres- 
sion of  an  honest  effort  to  rescue  children  from  conditions 
such  as  the  poets  have  depicted. 

Even  in  the  houses  of  industry,  however,  there  is  to  be 
noted  a  tendency  to  the  exploitation  of  child  labor.  The 
unfortunate  element  lies  in  the  fact  that  the  work  of  chil- 
dren was  expected  to  pay  expenses  "with  an  overplus." 
This  expectation  would  easily  lead  to  forcing  the  efforts  of 
children,  "as  much  work  being  required  of  each  of  them  as 
they  are  reasonably  to  perform.  ...  In  conformity  to  the 
plans  of  our  society,  children  from  five  or  six  years  of  age 
are  assembled  under  the  same  roof,  at  an  early  and  regular 


CIIILDRRX   OF    THI-:   P(^()R  153 

hour  of  the  morning,  kept  steadily  to  the  purpose  of  busi- 
ness— taught  that,  even  so  early  in  life,  they  are  able  to  main- 
tain tJicmseh'cs."  Like  Dyer  in  1757,  Ruggles  is  concerned 
with  increasing  the  wealth  of  the  kingdom. 

Sarah  Trimmer,  too,  concerned  as  she  is  primarily  with 
religious  aspects  of  the  child's  welfare,  falls  nevertheless 
into  the  habit  of  computing  the  money  value  of  work  done 
by  children.  If  only  ten  persons  in  each  of  the  ten  thou- 
sand parishes  of  England  and  Wales  earned  no  more  than 
a  halfpenny  a  day  for  three  hundred  days  in  the  year,"  the 
produce  of  their  labor  would  at  the  year's  end  amount  to 
62,500  pounds" ;  and  she  notes  that  "the  girls  of  the  Found- 
ling Hospital  under  their  present  excellent  matron,  earn  one 
hundred  pounds  a  year."  She  would,  therefore,  set  all  idle 
children  to  profitable  employment,  adducing  the  example  of 
thrifty  Dutch  children  who  earn  their  keep  and  more  by 
making  toys,  "which  serves  as  an  amusement,  as  well  as  a 
profitable  employment." 

She  describes  a  charitable  institution  which  is  a  modi- 
fication of  the  House  of  Industry.  In  the  Day  School  of 
Industry,  the  promiscuous  mingling  of  adults  and  children, 
which  had  led  to  overcrowding  and  resulting  abuses,  was 
eliminated.  As  soon  as  charity  workers  realized  that  in- 
dustrial life  as  represented  in  the  House  of  Industry  would 
destroy  all  sense  of  domestic  life,  day  schools  were  urged  for 
all  except  the  wretchedly  poor  and  orphans :  "children  com- 
monly receive  more  harm  than  good,  by  being  mixed  to- 
gether with  men  and  women,  and  this  is  too  much  the  case 
in  Parish  Workhouses."  That  the  houses  of  industry  were 
but  one  degree  removed  from  these  is  evident  from  Ruggles, 
who  observed  that  "the  dormitory  is  too  much  crowded ; 
three  or  four  boys  in  a  bed,  two  men  ;  this  numl>er  in  one  bed 
occasioned  the  air  to  be  disagreeable  to  the  smell." 


154  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Although  one  may  be  tempted  to  ascribe  Chatterton's 
Hnes  on  cottage  discomforts  to  Hterary  heightening,  Rug- 
gles  gives  evidence  of  the  naked  truth  of  the  poet's  concep- 
tion, in  a  report  of  his  visit  to  a  sick  cottager  in  whose 
househokl  the  cramped  space  preckided  separation  of  chil- 
dren from  adults,  and  the  well  from  the  sick.  ^  He  lays  this 
to  "that  miserable  economy  in  fitting  up  the  cottage,  which 
too  generally  has  denied  the  only  bed  room,  either  a  fire- 
place, or  a  casement  window  to  ventilate  the  air;  the  noise 
of  querulous  children ;  the  stench  of  confined  air,  rendered 
epidemic  by  morbid  effliuvia ;  the  vermin  too  frequently 
swarming  on  the  bodies  and  rags  of  the  wretched  inhabi- 
tants," such  causes  indicate  a  "depth  of  misery  which  hard 
labor  and  industry  ought  not  in  sickness  to  be  liable  to  en- 
dure." The  lines  in  Crabbe's  The  Parish  Register  read  al- 
most like  a  poetic  version  of  such  a  passage.  Crabbe  sees 
as  the  chief  cause  of  all  this  misery  of  children  the  mother's 
inability  to  "employ  the  vacant  hour."  In  poets  as  in  prose 
writers,  remedial  measures  are  almost  invariably  bound  up 
with  the  thought  of  the  spinning  and  weaving  industry  which 
Dyer  had  advocated  as  the  salvation  of  the  poor.  The  in- 
tolerable conditions  from  which  Crabbe's  children  suffer  are 
brought  about  by  lack  of  thrift. 

Here    are    no    wheels    for    either    wool    or    flax, 
But  packs  of  cards — made  up  of  sundry  packs. 

The  aims  and  methods  of  teaching  in  the  day  school 
were  the  same  as  in  the  school  of  industry.  The  main  in- 
terest lay  in  teaching  manual  work  and  regularity  of  habits. 
Children  were  taught  in  rotation  for  one  hour  each  day  to 

1  In  a  glass-blowing  district,  Hannah  and  Patty  More  entered 
a  row  of  hovels,  nineteen  containing  two  hundred  people — "both 
sexes  and  all  ages  herding  together."      (Mendip  Annals.) 


CHILURKN  OF  THE  K)OR  1  DD 

read  the  Bible  and  the  Prayer  Book.  Referring  to  other 
studies,  Sarah  Trimmer  held  that  there  is  no  "absolute 
necessity  for  children  of  the  lower  order  to  learn  these 
things  at  all."  She  excepts  the  ability  to  read  the  Bible, 
"for  I  regard  it  as  a  part  of  the  Birthright  of  the  Poor  as 
Britons,  to  read  the  BIBLE  in  their  native  language ;  and 
esteem  it  the  duty  of  their  supervisors  to  see,  at  least,  that 
they  are  enabled  to  do  it."  But  the  main  purpose  was  to 
teach  manual  occupation.  An  ambitious  boy  was  able  under 
this  system  to  rise  to  the  position  of  head  weaver  at  ten 
years  of  age,  and  after  fulfilling  the  institutional  require- 
ment of  teaching  a  successor,  v^as  entrusted  with  a  position 
of  responsibility  in  a  manufactory,  at  an  age  when  boys 
were  as  a  rule  first  apprenticed. 

Such  charitable  efforts  in  foundling  hospitals,  schools  of 
industry,  and  day  schools  of  industry  may  not  conform  to 
present-day  aims  and  ideals  in  humanitarian  relief ;  but  when 
studied  in  the  light  of  factory  employment  of  children,  it 
will  be  realized  that  children  in  such  institutions  were  in 
snug  harbor:  protected  on  the  one  hand  from  filthy  moral 
and  physical  home  conditions,  and  on  the  other  from  heart- 
less industrial  exploitation. 

Ruggles  reports  of  manufactories  that  "a  sacrifice  of 
health  and  morals  is  made  ...  to  pecuniary  advantages. 
The  children  are  crowded  in  close  apartments,  without  any 
regard  to  their  improvement,  excepting  in  one  particular 
branch  of  the  Manufactory,  for  which  probably  their  size 
will  disqualify  them  after  a  few  years,  when  they  must  give 
place  to  smaller  children,  and  turn  into  the  world  unacquaint- 
ed with  any  art,  by  which  they  may  gain  a  future  livelihood, 
and  if  they  are  females,  ignorant  of  even  the  use  of  the 
needle,  so  necessary  to  be  known  by  every  wife  and  mother 


156  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

in  the  lower  ranks  of  life."  ^  Children  did  literally  outgrow 
their  jobs.  The  machines  operated  to  advantage  by  them 
stood  so  near  the  floor  that  when  the  child  had  grown, 
he  had  made  himself  unfit  for  his  work. 

The  numerous  publications  which  make  up  the  nineteen 
volumes  of  Hannah  More's  collected  works  indicate  the 
class  distinction  which  dominated  all  efforts  at  social  relief. 
She  wrote  a  well-received  book  for  the  education  of  a 
princess.  Her  stories  for  common  folk  were  carefully  di- 
vided into  volumes  whose  titles  indicate  their  clearly-defined 
audience.  The  conservative  tendency  of  all  labors  in  the 
interests  of  the  poor  is  further  emphasized  by  her  Village 
Politics,  which  was  highly  praised  by  Walpole.  It  is  a 
dialogue  between  Jack  Anvil,  the  blacksmith,  and  Tom 
Hood,  the  mason,  and  was  written  to  counteract  Revolu- 
tionary principles  which  were  making  serious  headway 
among  the  discontented  poor.  Addressed  by  Will  Chip, 
a  country  carpenter,  to  all  the  mechanics,  journeymen,  and 
laborers  in  Great  Britain,  it  had  tremendous  vogue  in  its 
day,  and  served  its  purpose  in  counteracting  the  subversive 
pamphlets  and  tracts  that  had  found  their  way  into  work- 
shops and  coal-pits.  The  language  was  adapted  to  the 
class  of  readers  it  intended  to  reach.  Her  ballads,  com- 
posed with  the  intent  of  answering  the  "foolish  question" 
(which  was  often  heard  in  labor  circles  during  the  Great 
War)  "What  have  the  POOR  to  lose?"  in  case  of  a 
French  invasion,  contain  the  likable  Ploughman  s  Ditty.  It 
is  obviously  propagandist  in  its  idealization  of  cottage  life, 
and  hardly  represents  faithfully  the  class  of  wretchedly  poor 

1  White's  Clifton  Grove : 

The    pale    mechanic    leaves    the    laboring    loom, 
The  air-pent  hold,  the  pestilential  room. 


CHILDREN  OK  THK   IK)()R  157 

peasants  with  whom  she  was  concerned  in  her  charity 
work.  She  uses  the  return  at  eve  of  the  father,  together 
with  an  "atrocity"  accompaniment : 

On  Saturday-night 

Tis   still    my   delight, 
With  my  wages  to  run  home  the  faster ; 

But  if  Frenchmen  rule  here, 

I  may  look  far  and  near, 
But   I   never  shall  find  a   paymaster. 

I've  a  dear  little  wife. 

Whom  I  love  as  my  life; 
To  lose  her  I  shouldn't  much  like,  Sir ; 

And  'twou'd  make  me  run  wild 

To  see  my  sweet  child 
With  its  head  on  the  point  of  a  pike.  Sir. 

Among  Sarah  Trimmer's  many  examples  of  wretched- 
ness and  suffering,  it  is  pleasant  to  read  of  the  thrifty  widow 
of  Hasketon,  in  the  County  of  Suffolk,  who,  upon  the  death 
of  her  husband  in  1779,  was  left  with  fourteen  children, 
the  eldest  fourteen  years  old.  'Going  over  the  head  of  fac- 
tors and  rent  collectors,  she  persuaded  John  Way,  Esq., 
her  landlord,  to  allow  her  to  continue  as  cottager  tenant  at  a 
rent  of  thirteen  pounds  a  year.  iShe  refused  to  part  with 
any  of  her  children  to  a  house  of  industry,  and  by  the  sale 
of  milk,  butter,  and  cheese  from  two  cows,  saw  all  her 
children  either  well  placed  in  service  or  married  to  thrifty 
husbandmen.  By  training  her  eldest  daughter  to  care  for 
the  younger  children  while  she  herself  was  selling  her  pro- 
duce in  the  nearest  market  town  of  Waybridge,  two  miles 
distant,  she  had  managed  her  brood  so  well  that  she  could 
finally  leave  her  cottage  labor  at  the  age  of  fifty-five  years 
to  take  up  the  less  arduous  employment  of  nursing. 


158  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Such  details  of  a  happy  ending  to  what  in  most  instances 
would  have  been  a  calamity,  give  the  reader  of  eighteenth- 
century  poetry  greater  confidence  in  the  sincerity  of  poets 
whose  lines  contain  what  may  often  seem  to  be  a  colorless 
reference  to  widows  and  orphans.  The  widow  of  Hasketon 
was  one  of  the  exceptions  to  general  suffering  because  she 
secured  a  sympathetic  hearing  from  the  master  over  the 
heads  of  his  agents.  In  the  main,  readers  of  poetry  had 
come  into  contact  with  actual  scenes  of  suffering  which 
would  make  their  hearts  responsive  to  the  poet's  lines  on 
benevolence.  Such  conditions,  as  is  evident  from  the  pub- 
lications and  reports  of  poor-relief  societies,  were  faithfully 
portrayed  by  Crabbe.  Conditions  at  Aldborough  were  es- 
sentially like  those  at  Cheddar,  both  as  regards  physical 
squalor  and  spiritual  atrophy. 

Although  Thomson's  sympathy  with  suffering  cottage 
children  is  as  lively  as  that  of  Southey  and  Crabbe,  he  differs 
from  poets  like  Dyer  and  Langhorne  in  that  he  seems  like 
Cowper  to  be  satisfied  with  alms  and  public  institutions 
as  the  proper  methods  of  ameliorating  the  condition  of  chil- 
dren. He  appeals  to  man's  sense  of  justice  to  relieve  suf- 
fering humanity  from  the  injustice  which  man  works  on  his 
fellow  man. 

After  the  middle  of  the  century,  Dyer  and  Langhorne 
write  in  the  spirit  of  the  reforms  advocated  by  Raikes,  Mrs. 
Trimmer,  and  Hannah  More.  Where  sentimentalism  ended 
in  an  escape  from  the  haunts  of  man,  as  in  Bruce  and  Beat- 
tie,  ^  and  where  it  tended  to  throw  a  misty  veil  of  sentiment 
over  cruel  facts,  as  in  The  Deserted  Village  and  The  Cot- 
ter's Saturday-Night,  the  deep  sympathy  of  Dyer  and  Lang- 
horne led  to  specific  programs  of  reform  that  had  as  their 

1  Compare  Lavina  and  Edwin. 


CHILDREN  OF  TIIH   POOR  159 

object  the  removal  of  the  causes  of  poverty.  Dyer  had  ad- 
vocated teaching  the  child  habits  of  thrift  and  patient  appli- 
cation as  shields  against  intemperance  and  shiftlessness  that 
bring  suffering  in  their  train.  Langhorne  was  also  working 
for  the  removal  of  the  primary  causes  of  misfortune  when 
he  appealed  for  an  intelligent  administration  of  the  law. 

By  way  of  the  Sunday  School,  Raikes  struck  at  tlie  root 
of  the  problem :  and  Hannah  More,  who  left  London  salons 
and  bluestockings  for  the  children  of  miners  and  glaziers 
at  Cheddar,  held  to  fundamentals  in  her  efforts  to  give 
them  the  benefits  of  the  only  vocational  guidance  known  to 
the  eighteenth  century. 

When  applied  to  children  in  relation  to  their  environ- 
ment. Grabbers  accusation  that  poets  ignored  actual  condi- 
tions in  favor  of  pastoralities,  is  not  altogether  accurate, 
unless  the  industrial  abuses  of  child  labor,  which  Crabbe 
himself  did  not  notice,  are  included.  Through  their  op- 
timistic philosophy,  sentimental  poets  were  attracted  by 
those  elements  in  rural  life  which  contrasted  with  the  ob- 
vious vice  and  artificialities  of  city  life.  The  charming  pic- 
tures of  cottage  contentment  and  rural  felicity  to  be  found 
in  poetry  that  notices  childhood,  must  not  obscure  the  fact 
that  the  benevolists  were  awake  to  actual  conditions  of  suf- 
fering and  poverty  even  in  rural  communities.  The  most 
idyllic  of  the  cottage  motives,  the  return  at  eve  of  the  father 
after  a  day  of  labor,  is  most  often  pitched  in  a  minor  key. 
Even  in  The  Cotter's  Saturday-Night,  where  all  is  well 
with  the  children  of  the  household.  Burns  has  saddening 
premonitions  of  a  change  coming  over  the  simple  cottage 
life  of  his  beloved  Scotia.  .In  the  face  of  protests  from 
Thomson  to  Burns,  it  cannot  with  justice  be  said  that  con- 
ditions under  which  children  lived  were  not  noticed  by 
poets.     Dyer's  enthusiasm   for  his  program   of  industrious 


160  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

habits  as  the  remedy  for  the  ills  of  poverty,  led  him  to 
advocate  child  labor  in  the  spinning  industry  as  carried 
on  in  public  institutions.  Children  employed  in  organized 
industry  had  to  wait  until  Grahame's  Birds  of  Scotland  and 
Wordsworth's  The  Excursion  for  poets  who  championed 
their  cause,  many  years  before  Mrs.  Browning  wrote  The 
Cry  of  the  Children. 


CHAPTER  IV 

EDUCATION 

But  thanks  to  those,  whose  fond  parental  care 

To  Learning's  paths  my  youthful  steps  confined. 

I  need  not  shun  a  state  which  lets  me  share 

Each  calm  delight  that  soothes  the  studious  mind. 
Thomas   Cole,  Ode  to  Coiiteiifniciit. 

As  reflected  in  poetry,  the  history  of  education  in  the 
eighteenth  century  begins  and  ends  with  the  conflict  between 
the  traditional  methods  of  classical  education  and  the  utili- 
tarian training  advocated  by  John  Locke  and  his  disciples. 
A  persistent  attack  on  "cell-bred"  discipline  is  revealed  in 
poetry  from  Pope's  Dnnciad  to  Cowper's  Tirocinium.  After 
1762,  Rousseau's  enthusiasm  added  impetus  to  the  already 
widely  disseminated  doctrines  of  Locke.  Poetic  discussion 
of  the  moral  aspects  of  education  for  children  was  influenced 
by  the  evangelical  fervor  of  Whitefield  and  the  Wesleys. 

The  combined  influences  of  Locke.  Rousseau,  the  senti- 
mentalists, and  those  inspired  by  religious  fervor,  operated 
to  break  down  the  traditional  ciirriculum  and  the  methods 
by  which  it  was  administered.  Poets  are  agreed  with  Locke 
and  Rousseau  in  their  stated  preference  for  domestic  edu- 
cation. They  reflect  also  the  widening  interest  in  natural 
science,  which  went  hand  in  hand  with  utilitarian  propa- 
ganda. The  violent  attacks  on  established  methods  are 
essentially  democratic  in  tendency  in  that  they  imply  modi- 
fications to  meet  the  needs  of  the  masses  in  a  closer  approach 
to  utilitarian  standards.  The  desire  to  substitute  for  the  tra- 
ditional memoriter  exercises  a  real  knowledge  derived  from 


162  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

direct  observation  of  natural  phenomena,  ranges  poets 
on  the  side  of  those  who  insisted  that  the  child  should  be 
taught  by  observation  of  objects  in  nature.  Although  their 
attacks  produced  few  tangible  results  in  the  established 
schools,  in  that  they  did  not  make  themselves  felt  in  the 
classical  curriculum  at  all,  popularization  and  simplification 
of  text-books  on  arithmetic,  geography,  grammar,  and  na- 
tural history  reflect  a  growing  desire  to  meet  popular  needs. 
That  the  eighteenth  century  was  mainly  a  period  of  transi- 
tion and  preparation  is  clear  from  a  study  of  poetry  from 
Pope  to  Cowper. 

The  instinctive  objection  to  disciplinary  education  voiced 
by  the  early  romanticist  poets  was  occasionally  rein- 
forced by  satirical  thrusts  of  poets  who  belong  to  the 
classicist  tradition.  Sir  J.  H.  Moore's  Written  in  a  College 
Library  gives  a  satirical  picture  of  the  somnolent  state  of 
higher  education.  The  poet  has  often  seen  an  "ancient 
fellow"  who,  "free  from  the  cares  of  children,  noise,  and 
wife,"  enjoyed  smooth  moments  which  are  not  tokens  of  a 
vigorous  activity  in  educational  affairs.  ^  Although  John 
Gilbert  Cooper  had  been  a  pupil  of  Dr.  Nicholls  at  West- 
minster, and  evidently  a  close  student  of  the  classics  at 
Cambridge,  he  preferred  "contentment's  humble  lot"  to 
the  artificialities  of  court  and  school.  His  Epistles  (to  his 
friends  in  town,  from  Aristippus,  in  retirement,  1758)  are 
unfavorable  to  schools.  He  prefers  the  guidance  of  his 
heart  to  the  head  work  of  pedants.  His  point  of  view  is 
indicated  by  such  phrases  as  "bookish  rules,"  "hard  with  a 
comment's  iron  chain,"  "figures  and  bloated  tropes,"  "three- 
legged  syllogisms,"  "the  bubble  blowing  race,"  and  "grave 
pedantic  train." 

1  Compare  the  Autobiography  of  Gibbon,  passim,  for  conditions 
at  Oxford. 


EDUCATION  163 

Among  the  early  romanticists,  impatience  of  restraint  is 
voiced  in  the  extreme  language  of  Chatterton,  who  looks 
upon  the  pedant  as  the  "licensed  butcher  of  the  human 
mind,"  and  who  in  Haf^f^iucss  (1770)  makes  the  sweeping 
accusation, 

O  Education,  ever  in  the  wrong, 

To  thee  the  curses  of  mankind  belong. 

Alickle  glories  in  the  uncontrolled  impulses  unknown  to 
the  victims  of  "schooltaught  prudence  and  its  maxims  cold." 
As  he  treads  "Cintra's  summits"  and  views  the  scene  where 
the  Saracen  w^as  conquered,  he  prefers  the  vague  glow  with 
which  the  locality,  "of  name  unknown,"  suffuses  his  soul. 
He  feels  in  chivalry  the  dynamic  power  of  the  ideal.  In 
KncKi'lcdge  (1761)  he  scales  down  intellect  in  favor  of 
emotion  by  scorning  "lettered  pride"  and  the  boastful  claims 
of  *'star-crowned  science."  Sages  stray  and  grope  in  end- 
less night:  they  can  never  be  certain  of  their  conclusions. 
He  decides  to  pay  "silent  adoration"  and  to  be  "in  wonder 
lost."  Mason  holds  that  education  will  serve  but  to  "chill 
affection's  native  fires."  Knowledge  beyond  what  is  neces- 
sary to  save  the  individual  from  vice,  will  only  multiply 
his  cares.  School  routine  was  also  uncongenial  because  it 
interfered  w^ith  the  free  romantic  development  of  individu- 
ality. Bruce's  school  girl,  Lavina,  was  solitary  in  her  habits. 
Beattie  is  unfavorable  to  formal  instruction  when  he  does 
not  wish  to  mope  over  the  schoolman's  "peevish  page,"  and 
exclaims, 

Perish  the  lore  that  deadens  young  desire. 

Instances  might  be  multiplied,  but  it  is  clear  that  romantic 
tendencies  were  in  a  vague  way  opposed  to  organized  edu- 
cation. Poets  preferred  not  to  endure  the  restraint  of 
school  life ;  confinement  was  irksome  to  the  spirit  which 
vaguely  prompted  their  love  of  freedom. 


164  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Yet  there  is  in  Thomson's  Liberty  (Part  III)  a  striking 
passage  which  indicates  that  it  is  better  for  the  schoolboy 
not  to  be  troubled  by  gleams  of  the  ideal.  Thomson  argues 
that  if  man  rose  to  a  glimpse  of  ideal  beauty,  he  would 
shrink  up  like  a  flower  before  the  mid-day  sun.  The  ce- 
lestial regions  to  which  Liberty  retired  after  the  decadence 
of  Roman  liberty  are  too  bright  to  be  viewed  by  man.  The 
light  is  too  keen  for  mortals ;  therefore,  says  Thomson, 
sacred  be  the  veil  that  clouds  the  light.  It  is  curious  that 
Thomson,  precursor  as  he  is  in  so  many  ways  of  romantic 
tendencies,  should  have  applied  this  thought  to  childhood. 

A  sense  of  higher  life  would  only  damp 
The  schoolboy's  task,  and  spoil  his  playful  hours. 
Nor  could  the  child  of  Reason,  feeble  man, 
With  vigour  through  his  infant  being  drudge, 
Did  brighter  worlds,  their  unimagined  bliss 
Disclosing,  dazzle  and  dissolve  his  mind. 

The  romanticists  were  ever  trying  to  break  through  the 
literal  fact  to  the  spiritual  meaning  which  it  veiled.  Words- 
worth gloried  in  the  fact  that  as  a  schoolboy  at  Hawkeshead 
he  was  "disturbed"  by  gleams  of  divine  truth.  It  is  evident, 
however,  that  as  far  as  childhood  is  in  his  mind,  Thomson 
was  not  ready  to  advocate  romantic  emotions  that  would  set 
the  child  apart  from  his  fellows  because  of  a  faculty  of 
spiritual  vision  that  made  him  "an  eye  among  the  blind." 

There  was  little  danger  that  the  curriculum  of  eighteenth- 
century  schools  would  develop  mystic  insight  into  a  realm  of 
romantic  spirituality.  The  curriculum,  in  so  far  as  it  was 
noticed  by  poets,  was  condemned  as  lacking  in  the  spirit 
that  gives  vitality  to  education.  The  general  accusation 
was  that  schools  emphasized  the  letter  to  the  exclusion  of 
the  spirit.  In  the  Dunciad,  Pope  conceives  the  goddess  of 
Dullness   as    sending   ''Stupefaction   mild"    to   every   pupil. 


EDUCATION  165 

Education  made  no  attempt  to  impart  real  knowledge ;  but 
instead, 

Beneath  her  footstool  science  groans  in  chains.      (IF) 

When  Pope  arraigns  pedagogical  methods  in  the  fourth 
book  of  the  Dunciad,  he  has  in  mind  endowed  schools,  such 
as  Winchester,  Eton,  and  Westminster,  which  he  specifically 
mentions.  Schools  of  this  type  were  on  foundations  that 
date  back  as  far  as  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries. 
By  the  eighteenth  century  they  were  open  only  to  sons  of 
the  nobility  and  the  wealthy  class.  The  curriculum  was 
essentially  the  same  as  that  intended  for  boys  at  the  time  of 
the  Reformation.  The  course  was  based  on  Latin  and 
Greek.  Its  ideals  were  disciplinary :  the  teaching  had  lost 
touch  with  life.  During  the  seventeenth  century,  with  the 
advent  of  natural  science  and  the  inductive  philosophy  of 
Bacon,  there  had  been  protests  against  exclusive  attention  to 
classical  learning.  Milton's  letter  to  Hartlib  had  empha- 
sized the  need  of  correlating  the  curriculum  with  the 
practical  demands  of  life.  Locke's  Thoughts  (1693),  ^^~ 
though  cautious  in  not  condemning  Latin  and  Greek  out- 
right, outlined  a  practical  regimen  for  sons  who  were 
to  be  leaders  in  public  life.  ^  The  objective  was  practical 
usefulness. 

Pope  catches  the  spirit  of  these  writers  in  his  ridicule  of 
the  conventional  instruction  given  in  endowed  schools.  The 
pedagogue  argues  before  the  throne  of  Dullness,  that  since 
man  is  distinguished  from  brutes  by  words,  words  are 
man's  province.  Therefore  "Words  we  teach  alone."  The 
narrower  way  is  always  preferred  in  his  system.  Placed  to 
guide  youth  at  the  door  of  learning,  he  never  suffers  it  to 

^  Locke    would    have    Greek    studied    hy    professional    scholars 
only. 


166  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

"stand  too  wide."  As  soon  as  a  boy  shows  signs  of  mental 
awakening  by  asking  questions, 

We  ply  the  memory,  we  load  the  brain, 

Bind  rebel  wit,  and  double  chain  on  chain, 

Confine  the  thought,  to  exercise  the  breath, 

And  keep  them  in  the  pale  of  Words  till  death. 

Whate'er  the  talents,  or  howe'er  designed, 

We  hang  one  jingling  padlock  on  the  mind.      (IV) 

The  footnote  informs  the  reader  that  these  lines  are  "A  re- 
capitulation of  the  whole  course  of  modern  education  .  .  . 
which  confines  Youth  to  the  study  of  Words  only  in 
Schools."  When  a  pupil  shows  an  inclination  toward  in- 
vestigation in  natural  science,  the  pedagogue  turns  the 
child's  interest  to  trifles — ^makes  of  him  a  virtuoso.  The 
"P.  W."  footnote  states  that  Dullness  is  careful  to  charge 
the  "Investigators  of  Nature  to  amuse  themselves  in  trifles, 
and  rest  in  second  causes,  with  a  total  disregard  of  the  first." 
The  result  of  this  slavery  to  words  is  a  "trifling  head  and  a 
contracted  heart." 

When  there  was  danger  of  innovation  in  high  places  in 
the  educational  world,  a  sable  shoal  of  "broad  hats,  and 
hoods,  and  caps"  circled  about  Dullness  and,  as  friends  of 
Aristotle,  championed  traditional  learning.  As  a  matter  of 
fact,  the  heads  of  the  University  of  Oxford  met  in  1703  to 
censure  Locke's  Essay  of  Human  Understanding,  and  to 
forbid  its  being  read.  The  tremendous  yawn  of  Dullness, 
which  infects  all  the  court,  is  explained  to  mean  the  schools, 
where,  "though  the  boys  are  unwilling  to  sleep,  the  Masters 
are  not."  Yet  in  the  face  of  such  protests  from  Pope,  the 
schoolboy  was  destined  to  continue  "of  painful  pedantry 
the  poring  child." 

Gilbert  West's  Education  (1751)  is  an  imitation  of  the 
form  and  diction  of  Spenser's  Faerie  Queene,  and  reflects  the 
opinions  of  Locke  on  education.     In  fact,  Locke  in  the  guise 


EDUCATION  167 

of  a  palmer  conducts  the  children  of  the  Fairy  Knight 
through  the  kingdom  of  Custom  to  "Paedia's  house."  Their 
adventures  in  the  domain  of  the  fierce  giant  Custom,  and 
their  arrival  in  the  valley  where  Paedia  lies  asleep,  consti- 
tute the  narrative  with  which  West  has  bound  up  his  attack 
on  the  classical  curriculum.  Alluding  to  Locke's  preoccu- 
pation in  Thoughts  with  the  earliest  stages  of  childhood, 
West  praises  the  eminent  philosopher  for  holding  up  his 
''faithful  light"  before  the  uncertain  feet  of  children. 

Ne  with  the  glorious  gifts  elate  and  vain 
Lock'd  he  his  wisdom  up  in  churlish  pride; 
But,  stooping  from  his  height,  would  even  deign 
The  feeble  steps  of  infancy  to  guide. 

During  their  wanderings  in  search  of  Education,  the 
pilgrims  come  to  a  roaring  flood  stained  by  "infant  gore." 
Beside  it  stands  a  "birchen  grove"  that  with  "its  bitter 
juice  empoisoned  all  the  flood."  After  fording  this  cruel 
stream  into  which  children  were  being  lashed  ("By  nurses, 
guardians,  fathers,  dragged  along"),  they  come  to  a  land- 
scaped garden  which  is  the  seat  of  Learning.  Nine  virgins 
who  sit  there  in  "mimic  majesty"  preside  over  "every  learned 
school."  They  affect  antiquities  even  in  their  dress,  are 
blind  to  the  charms  of  modern  knowledge,  and  scorn  the 
language  of  their  country.  They  mourn  over  the  "rubbish 
of  Rome  and  Athens,"  gathering  up  each  little  scrap,  "how- 
ever foul  or  torn."     They  are  so  enamoured  of  antiquity  that 

Ne  sacred  Truth  herself  would  they  embrace, 
Unwarranted,  unknown   in   their  forefathers'  days. 

They  are  vassals  of  the  giant  Custom,  who  endeavors  to 
take  in  the  knight's  son.  In  place  of  the  usual  compliance 
the  knight  attacks  the  giant.  Hard  pressed,  Custom  sum- 
mons his  followers,  who  are  fainthearted  and  timorous- 
minded  at  best.     He  had  trained  them  from  infancy  to  "hug 


168  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

his  chain" ;  he  had  craftily  persuaded  them  to  revere  both 
the  good  and  the  noxious,  the  rational  and  the  vain,  as  **in- 
stitutions  sage  and  venerable."  Therefore  they  were  seized 
with  terror  at  sight  of  the  knight  and  his  children. 

Attended  by  that  palmer  sage  and  bold, 
Whose  venturous  search  of  devious  truth  whilere 
Spread   through   the    realms   of   Learning   horrour   drear, 
Y-seized  were  at  first  with  terrours  great ; 
And  in  their  boding  hearts  began  to  fear, 
Dissentions  factious,  controversial  hate, 
And  innovations  strange  in  Custom's  peaceful  state. 

The  knight  and  his  train  are  hissed  as  they  ride  on  in  their 
survey  of  the  domains  of  Custom,  where  the  knight  could 
observe  nothing  sound  or  wholesome.  Although  he  saw  that 
Custom's  vassals  declined  the  "wine-stained  board  Of 
beastly  Comus,"  they  had  nevertheless  resigned  their  hearts 
to  idle  joys. 

As  the  knight  would  not  have  his  son  breathe  even  this 
"sweet  contagion,"  he  turned  aside  from  the  beaten  paths 
to  a  majestic  mountain  on  the  side  of  which  is  a  thickly- 
shaded  grove.  There  the  light  was  mellow,  as  though  the 
sun's  rays  had  passed  "Through  windows  dim  with  holy 
arts  pourtrayed."  They  came  upon  a  venerable  matron, 
asleep,  whom  the  knight  addresses  as  "fair  island  queen" 
and  "mother  of  heroes,"  and  who  is  none  other  than  Paedia. 
Upon  hearing  the  knight,  she  awakes  from  her  melancholy 
trance  and  appeals  to  the  nobles  of  Britain  to  realize  their 
responsibility  as  leaders  of  the  people.  At  this  point  West 
almost  wholly  abandons  his  archaic  vocabulary  in  the  ardor 
of  his  appeal  to  the  nobles  to  join  in  overcoming  the  abuses 
of  the  giant  Custom.  He  sees  a  time  when  wisdom  and 
virtue  will  again  come  to  the  land,  once  the  yoke  of  "cell- 
bred  discipline"  has  been  thrown  off.     Paedia  will  then  re- 


EDUCATION  169 

ascend  her  throne,  surrounded  by  "vivid"  laurels  and  "frag- 
rant" flowers  ;  while  "yon  supercilious  pedant  train"  must 
be  by  her 

Y-tanght  a  lesson  in  their  schools  unknown, 
'To  Learning's   richest   treasures   to  prefer 
The  knowledge  of  the  world,  and  man's  great  business  there.' 

The  utilitarian  nature  of  West's  thesis  reflects  the  poet's 
knowledge  of  Locke's  Thoughts,  which  is  concerned  with 
preparing  a  young  nobleman  for  a  responsible  position  in 
the  state.  The  prophecies  of  Paedia  are  clearly  in  the  name 
of  utilitarian  education.  But  West,  however  strong  and  di- 
rect his  stand  against  the  humanities,  does  not  mean  to  be 
radical  to  the  extent  of  complete  substitution  of  a  modern 
course.  Although  the  knight  is  revolutionary  in  that  he 
succeeds  in  carrying  his  son  through  the  domain  of  Custom 
into  the  valley  of  progressive  realities,  Paedia  reveals  not  so 
much  radicalism  as  a  conservative  liberalism  that  would 
retain  whatever  squares  with  virtue  and  vital  knowledge  in 
the  ancients.     This  is  to  be 

Joined  with  whatever  else  of  modern  date 
Maturer  judgment,  search  more  accurate, 
Discovered  have  of  Nature,  Man,  and  God. 

Pope  and  West  have  much  the  same  objective;  both 
poets  are  keenly  aware  of  the  need  of  reform  that  shall  modi- 
fy contemporary  overemphasis  on  word  study.  Where  West's 
Paedia  pleads  for  a  course  that  shall  combine  modem  sub- 
jects with  those  of  ancient  days,  Pope's  Dullness,  who  is 
disturbed  by  unmistakable  signs  of  a  desire  for  innovation, 
sighs  for  a  pedant  king  like  James  I,  who  will  rule  a  court 
with  Latin  ("stick  the  doctor's  chair  into  the  throne"),  a 
king  who  will  ''Give  law  to  Words,  and  war  with  Words 
alone"  (Dunciad,  1\). 


170  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

John  Lang^horne  also  turns  from  the  study  of  words  to 
the  observation  of  nature.  His  Inscription  on  the  Door  of  a 
Study  tells  the  student  who  would  enter  there  to  come  with 
an  open  mind.     He  must  forget  his  pedantic  lore, 

And  all  that  superstition,  fraught 

With  folly's     lore,  thy  youth  has  taught — 

Leave  it,  and  learn  to  think  again. 

As  he  turns  over  volumes  of  the  "mighty  dead"  he  must  re- 
member that  authors  are  human  beings  and  that  first  "from 
Nature's  works  we  drew  our  knowledge/'  Langhorne  ad- 
vises the  man  of  inquiring  spirit  to  enter  "yonder  grove"  if 
he  wishes  to  find  true  knowledge.  This  advice  is  in  harmony 
with  the  questionings  and  injunctions  of  Defoe's  Complete 
English  Gentleman.  Defoe  had  asked,  "But  is  it  worth  any 
gentleman's  while,  as  Oldham  says,  to  go  seven  years  to  the 
Grammar  Bridewell  (the  school)  and  there  beat  Greek  and 
Latin?"  Defoe's  answer  is,  "The  knowledge  of  things,  not 
words,  makes  a  scholar."  Langhorne  writes  in  The  En- 
largement of  the  Mind  (1763)  of  the 

dull   inmate   of  pedantic   walls, 
On  whose  old  walk  the  sun-beam  seldom  falls, 
Who  knows  of  Nature,  and  of  man  no  more 
Than  fills  some  page  of  antiquated  lore — 
* 

Something  of  men   these   sapient   drones   may  know, 
Of  men  that  lived  two  thousand  years  ago. 

Such  men  despise  the  "better  knowledge  of  the  world"  and 
scorn  the  man  who  looks  about  him  on  nature.  Langhorne 
seems  to  have  had  a  vision  as  early  as  1763  of  a  course  of 
study  that  woidd  embrace  natural  history,  including  the 
study  of  man.  In  place  of  the  "sages  boasting  o'er  the 
wrecks  of  time"  he  would  make  nature  the  preceptress  of 


EDUCATION  171 

children.  In  this  respect  he  is  in  advance  of  Locke,  wlio 
had  urged  mainly  that  the  child  should  not  be  loaded  with 
memory  work  but  be  made  to  think  and  reason  for  himself. 
Langhorne  leans  toward  doctrines  like  those  of  Rousseau, 
who  condemned  language  study  for  children  except  in  the 
mother  tongue,  and  who  wished  to  substitute  knowledge 
based  on  direct  observation.  Langhorne  would  have  chil- 
dren and  men  look  about  them ;  he  wishes  them  to  open  their 
eyes  and  understand  the  visible  world.  Nature  is  to  him 
a  ''sacred  guide." 

See  on  each  page  her  beauteous  volume  bear 
The  golden  characters  of  good  and  fair. 
All   human   knowledge    (blush   collegiate   pride!) 
Flows   from   her   works,   to   none   that   reads   denied. 

Attacks  on  the  humanities  were  strengthened  by  the 
aid  of  those  who,  like  Joseph  Priestley,  would  substitute 
scientific  curiosity  for  traditional  interest  in  the  classics. 
Priestley  is  convinced  that  at  Warrington  xA.cademy  the  in- 
struction is  ''too  scholastic,  consisting  of  those  studies  which 
were  originally  thought  requisite  to  form  the  divine,  and  the 
philosopher  only,  and  had  no  direct  view  to  civil  and  active 
life ;  and  yet  the  greater  part  of  our  pupils  were  not  intended 
for  any  of  the  learned  professions."  He  expresses  the  point 
of  view  held  by  men  of  the  century,  like  Bentham,  Black- 
stone,  and  Adam  Smith,  whose  influence  on  educational 
theory  was  wholly  in  the  direction  of  useful  knowledge.  ' 

1  The  scientific  researches  of  Priestley  and  others  were  noticed 
by  poets.  John  Scott  is  overwhelmed  by  the  immensity  of  the  new 
stores  of  nature  which  science  has  opened  up.  They  are  vast 
"beyond  what  e'en  a  Priestley  can  explore."  Mason's  Ode  to  Mr. 
Pinchbeck  notices  the  "pint  of  Priestley's  air."  Lovcll  calls  for 
Priestley's  wand.  He  would  like  to  "tame  the  storm  .  .  .  with 
calm  expectant  joy"  like  Franklin,  who  could  "in  viewless  channels 
shape    the    lightning's    course."      Mason    gives    "sagest    Verulam" 


172  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  lack  of  adequate  text-books  hampered  the  study  of 
science  among  children.  A  boy  at  school  had  practically  to 
remain  a  virtuoso  for  lack  of  teachers  or  books  to  guide 
him  in  his  observations  of  plant  life.  ^  This  is  illustrated  in 
the  experience  of  Sir  Joseph  Banks,  who  was  a  companion 
of  Captain  Cook  on  the  voyage  of  the  ''Endeavor"  to  Aus- 
tralia. When,  as  a  pupil  at  Eton,  he  was  returning  alone 
from  bathing,  he  observed  the  beauty  of  flowers  by  the 
hedgerow  in  the  lane.  Although  detemiined  to  study 
botany,  he  could  find  no  one  to  teach  him  except  the  old 
wives  of  the  neighborhood.  During  a  holiday  he  came 
upon  Gerard's  *'Herball,"  and  carried  it  back  in  triumph  to 
Eton.  Such  an  experience  makes  it  easy  to  see  why 
Pope  was  moved  to  ridicule  the  attempts  of  teachers  to 
sidetrack  the  interest  of  boys  in  natural  history. 

credit  for  banishing  "childish  vanity"  from  the  groves  of  learning. 
Bacon  is  looked  upon  as  the  prophet  of  unborn  science.  Wilkie 
likev^^ise  notices  him  as  the  dispeller  of  "Gothic  night"  and  as  the 
"dawning  light" : 

When  ignorance  possessed  the  schools 

And  reigned  by  Aristotle's  rules, 

A  man  was  tauglit  to  shut  his  eyes, 

And  grow  abstracted — to  be  wise. 
Mickle  reflects  the  new  enthusiasm  for  natural  science  in  Knowledge. 
He  joys  to  trace  with  Boyle  how  matter  takes  ten  thousand  forms 
in  metal,  plants,  and  worms.  And  Soame  Jenyns,  after  flying  with 
Newton  "O'er  all  the  rolling  orbs  on  high,"  traces  the  mazes  of 
nature  with  "labouring  Boyle."  and  with  him  admiringly  observes 
"matter's   surprising  subtilty." 

^  John  Scott  had  often  searched  the  pages  of  Linnaeus. 
"The   Scamian   sage,   whose  wondrous   toil, 
Had  classed  the  vegetable  race." 
On  the  poet's  botanizing  excursions,  Linnaeus   must   have  been   his 
chief  reliance. 


EDUCATION  173 

After  the  middle  of  tlie  century,  text-books  showed  a 
tendency  to  meet  the  interest  of  children  in  the  world  about 
them.  In  view  of  the  dominating-  position  Newton  holds  in 
the  estimation  of  poets,  it  is  not  surprising  to  find  as  early  as 
1754  A  Plain  and  Familiar  Introduction  to  the  Nczctonian- 
Philosophy.^  Newberry  included  in  his  "Circle  of  Sciences" 
an  attractive  book  on  Newtonian  philosophy  (1761)  ;  Tom 
Telescope,  a  young  student,  explains  the  laws  of  mechanics 
with  the  aid  of  familiar  objects.  Many  publications  show 
a  tendency  to  simplify  and  popularize  general  science.  Mrs. 
Trimmer  in  1780  wrote  An  Easy  Introduction  to  the  Knoivl- 
edge  of  Nature,  in  which  she  gives  Isaac  Watts  credit  for 
stimulating  her  to  wTite  for  children  in  such  a  way  as  to 
interest  them  in  birds,  animals,  fish,  insects,  and  flow^ers. 
John  Aikin's  Calendar  of  Nature  (fourth  edition,  1785)  is 
dedicated  to  Mrs.  Barbauld  and  reflects  the  nature  lessons 
of  Rousseau's  Entile.  William  Mavor's  Natural  History 
(1800)  is  the  best  volume  on  the  subject  for  use  in  schools. 
Priscilla  Wakefield's  Introduction  to  Botany  (1796)  illus- 
trates the  tendency  to  write  books  on  separate  phases  of  the 
general  subject.-  In  the  last  quarter  of  the  century,  Cowper 
is  abreast  of  his  age.  He  conceives  it  to  be  one  of  the  chief 
delights  of  a  parent  to  give  his  child  vital  knowledge  based 
on  direct  observation : 

1  Newton  is  nicntionecl,  and  almost  deified,  in  scores  of  pas- 
sages from  Thomson  to  Wordsworth. 

-  For  references,  especially  to  books  not  available  on  this  side 
of  the  Atlantic,  I  am  indebted  to  a  very  interesting  study:  L'educa- 
tion  en   Angleterre   entre    1750 — 1800   Apergn    sur   I'influence   peda- 

gogique  de  J.  J.  Rousseau  en  Angleterre.  These pour  le  Doctorat 

de    rUniversite    Presentee   a    la    Faculte    des    Lettres    de    Paris    par 
Jacques  Pons.      Paris,  1919. 


174  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

To  show  him  in  an  insect,  or  a  flower, 
Such  microscopic  proof  of  skill  and  power, 
As,  hid  from  ages  passed.  God  now  displays. 


In  order  to  make  the  subject  matter  of  these  studies  com- 
prehensible to  young  minds,  it  was  essential  to  study  the 
mother  tongue.  Both  Pope  and  West  had  deplored  the 
lack  of  attention  to  the  vernacular.  Their  attacks  were 
specifically  supported  by  Thomas  Sheridan's  prose  treatise 
on  British  Education;  or  The  Source  of  the  Disorders  of 
Great  Britain  (1756).  The  title  page  informs  the  reader 
that  the  prevailing  evils  are  the  ''natural  and  necessary  con- 
sequences of  the  present  defective  System  of  Education,"  by 
which  Sheridan  means  the  classical  curriculum.  He  re- 
peats the  same  arguments  already  noted  in  the  Dimciad  and 
West's  Education.  His  constructive  plan  follows  the  cue 
of  West's  observation  that  the  muses  who  presided  over  the 
springs  of  learning  despised  their  native  language.  Sheri- 
dan attempts  to  show  that  "  a  revival  of  the  art  of  speaking, 
and  the  study  of  our  own  language  might  contribute,  in  a 
great  measure,  to  the  cure  of  these  evils."  He  turns  the 
conventional  arguments  employed  in  favor  of  the  classics,  to 
show  the  practical  value  of  an  intelligent  and  systematic 
study  of  the  mother  tongue.  He  argues  that  everyone  will 
acknowledge  the  need  of  effective  public  speakers  in  Parli- 
ament and  on  the  forum,  and  that,  as  is  clear  from  the  essays 
of  Addison  and  others,  clergymen  are  in  need  of  proper 
training  in  the  mother  tongue  if  they  are  to  read  the  service 
in  such  a  way  that  the  Establishment  may  retain  a  vital  hold 
on  the  masses.  Pope's  lines  on  the  dismissal  of  students, 
after  a  purely  theoretical  schooling,  had  incisively  summar- 
ized the  €vil : 

Then,  blessing  all,  "Go,  Children  of  my  care ! 

To   Practice  now   from   Theory   repair."      (Dunciad,  IV) 

^   Tirocinium   (636-38). 


EDUCATION  175 

Byrom  likewise  realized  the  evils  resulting  from  inat- 
tention to  correctness  and  power  in  the  use  of  English. 
This  is  evident   from  his  strictures  in  Advice  to  the  Rev. 

Messrs.  H and  H •  to  Preach  Slozi',  which 

emphasizes  the  need  of  training. 

What  is  a  sermon,  good  or  bad, 
If  a  man  reads  it  like  a  lad? 
To  hear  some  people,  when  they  preach. 
How  they  run  o'er  all  parts  of  speech, 
And  neither  raise  a  word,  nor  sink. 
Our  learned  bishops,  one  would  think. 
Had  taken  schoolboys  from  the  rod. 
To  make  ambassadors  of  God. 

Poets  and  prose  writers  are  alike  alive  to  the  shortcom- 
ings of  the  prevailing  system,  which  does  not  prepare  boys 
for  the  duties  of  life.  ^ 

Sheridan  sees  a  way  out  of  the  difficulty.  He  admits 
that  English  has  lacked  stability ;  but  Doctor  Johnson's  Dic- 
tionary may  now^  serve  as  a  standard.  True  stability,  he 
continues,  can  result  only  from  thorough  teaching  of  Eng- 
lish in  the  schools.  He  is  convinced  that  "nothing  can  be 
a  greater  national  concern  than  the  care  of  our  language," 
and  concludes  that  the  schools  should  labor  to  secure  in 
their  scholars  a  facility,  clearness,  and  elegance  by  daily 
exercise  in  their  own  language.  And  as  the  art  of  si>eaking 
can  be  acquired  only  with  difficulty,  it  must  be  taught  in 
the  schools  by  "study,  precept,  and  example."  These  con- 
tentions are  in  harmony  with  Pope's  doctrine  in  the  Duuciad. 
It  seemed  odd  to  Pope  that  the  young  graduate  could  on 
the  grand  tour  forget  his  classical  acquirements,  in  Italy  of 

1  Compare  Swift's  Letter  to  a  Young  Clergyman. 


176  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

all  countries.  If  he  found  no  practical  use  for  them  on 
classic  ground,  they  could  be  of  little  value  to  him  at  home.  ^ 

Walpole's  comment  on  the  great  applause  accorded  the 
Eton  boy's  English  address  of  welcome  to  the  King  and 
Queen  in  1762,  indicates  the  drift  toward  a  recognition  of 
the  mother  tongue.  "It  was  English,  which  is  right.  Why 
should  we  talk  Latin  to  our  kings  rather  than  Russ  or  Iro- 
quois ?"  Prior  had  felt  the  need  of  apology  for  the  English 
Prologue  (1695)  spoken  by  the  Westminster  schoolboy, 
Lord  Buckhurst,  at  a  performance  of  Dryden's  Cleomenes. 
The  boy  hesitated  to  welcome  friends  of  the  school  "in  poor 
English."  On  the  other  hand,  half  a  century  later,  Byrom's 
Verses  for  the  Manchester  Free  Grammar  School  in  1748, 
on  the  occasion  of  the  breaking  up  of  the  school,  shows  that 
six  boys  spoke  in  English  and  only  one  in  Latin. 

The  attack  on  the  classics  was  humorously  carried  for- 
ward by  Cawthorn  in  Wit  and  Learning,  an  Allegory  ^ : 

Each  schoolboy  sees,  with  half  an  eye, 
The  quarrels  of  the  Pagan  sky. 

Before  he  was  six  years  old,  the  boy  played  a  thousand 
waggish  tricks ;  he  drilled  a  hole  in  Vulcan's  kettles,  broke  a 
prong  from  Neptune's  trident,  and  stole  the  favorite  sea- 
knot  of  Amphitrite.  The  waggery  of  this  child  is  presented 
with  a  gusto  that  betrays  the  poet's  sympathies. 

Cawthorn's  allegorical  poem  The  Birth  and  Education  of 
Genius  traces  the  progressive  stages  of  a  child's  education. 
After  Genius  had  learned  to  read  at  the  dame's  school,  his 
father  Phoebus  experienced  difficulty  in  finding  a  suitable 
tutor:  there  were  too  many  dullards  "among  the  doctors  of 
Parnassus," 

^  Dropped  the  dull  lumber  of  the  Latin  store, . 
Spoiled  his  own  language,  and  acquired  no  more. 

2  Spoken  at  the  Anniversary,  1757   (at  Tunbridge  School). 


EDUCATION  177 

Who  scarce  had  skill  enough  to  teach 
Old  Lilly's  elements  of  speech. 

Finally,  however,  Phoebus  came  upon  Criticism,  who  spoke 
"pure  Latin,  and  your  Attic  Greek" :  he  was  in  fact  the  ad- 
miration of  his  college.  lie  could  detect  the  slightest  liter- 
ary flaw ;  old  authors  were  his  bosom  friends.  Versed  in 
all  the  trifles  of  antiquity,  he  wrote  learnedly,  like  lientley,  on 
the  origin  of  whistles.  Apollo  was  glad  of  all  his  lore ;  yet, 
careful  of  his  son,  he  more  than  suspected 

That  all  this  load  of  erudition 

Might  overlay  his  parts  at  once. 

And    turn    him    out   a    lettered    dunce. 

The  question  of  classical  studies  is  brought  forward  in 
Robert  Lloyd's  Epistle  to  J.  B.  Esq.  (1757).  Lloyd,  who 
had  been  an  usher  at  Westminster,  desired  a  natural  educa- 
tion for  youth.  A  "truant  from  the  pedant's  school,"  he 
would  rid  himself  of  antiquated  rules.  The  artificiality  and 
stiff  formality  of  classical  teaching  were  uncongenial  to 
him.  ^     He  scorns  pedants 

Who  waste  their  time,  and  fancies  vex 
With  asper,  lenis,  circumflex. 
And  talk  of  mark  and  punctuation. 
As  'twere  a  matter  of  salvation. 

In  Genius,  Envy,  and  Time,  a  fable  Addressed  to  William 
Hogarth,  Esq.,  he  confesses  himself  to  have  been  a  worship- 
per of  truth  from  his  earliest  years,  and  as  a  result  scorns 

^  Had    Shakespeare    crept    by    modern    rules. 
We'd  lost  his  witches,   fairies,   fools : 
Instead  of  all  that  wild  creation. 
He'd  formed  a  regular  plantation, 
A  garden  trim,  and  all  enclosed, 
In  nicest  symmetry  disposed. 


178  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

the  ''.gloss  of  knowing  fools"  who  follow  mechanical  pre- 
cepts. This  attitude  is  revealed  also  in  a  scornful  couplet 
in  A  Dialogue : 

Or  give  the  Roman  proper  word 

To    things    the    Romans    never    heard. 

The  foregoing  criticisms  were  focused  on  the  curriculum 
in  schools  that  were  feeders  to  the  great  universities.  The 
course  of  study  was  intended  for  boys  who  were  ambitious, 
like  the  son  of  Thomas  Warton's  Gloucestershire  divine,  to 
wear  a  gown  or  to  enter  one  of  the  professions.  In  the 
Progress  of  Discontent  (1746),  Warton  has  the  son  brought 
to  the  university,  his  chief  reliance  being  ''Horace  by  heart, 
and  Homer  in  Greek."  In  the  same  way  when  Graeme  was 
stimulated  by  the  thought  of  preferment  through  the  chan- 
nels of  education,  he  traveled  the  only  safe  road,  that  of  the 
classics.  His  Student  reveals  the  thoroughness  and  patience 
with  which  he  had  applied  himself  to  the  established  routine : 

Fired  with  the  prospect,  I  embraced  the  hint, 
A  grammar  borrowed,  and  to  work  I  went; 
The  scope  and  tenor  of  each  rule  I  kept, 
No  accent  missed  me,  and  no  gender  'scaped ; 
I    read    whate'er   commenting   Dutchmen    wrote, 
Turned  o'er  Stobaeus.  and  could  Suidas  quote; 
In  lettered  Gellius  traced  the  bearded  sage, 
Through  all  the  windings  of  a  wise  adage. 

In  view  of  contemporary  customs  it  was  reasonable  that 
such  conscientious  efforts  should  have  raised  high  hopes 
that  "some  modern  Laelius"  would  single  him  out  for  ad- 
vancement. 

As  Winchester,  Eton,  and  Westminster  were  closest  to 
the  universities,  their  curriculum,  method,  and  text-books 
were  as  a  rule  adopted  by  outlying  grammar  schools.  This 
resulted  in  a  uniformity  of  preparation  that  facilitated  the 


EDUCATION  179 

matriculation  of  students  at  Oxford  and  Cambridge.  To 
accomplish  this  purpose,  only  the  traditional  subjects  were 
taught ;  the  original  intention  of  the  founders  was  pretty 
strictly  adhered  to.  Grammar  schools  throughout  England 
had  been  founded  like  the  school  at  Hargrave,  near  Chester, 
"for  the  government,  education,  and  instruction  of  youth  in 
Grammar  and  \'irtue."  ^  From  the  Cathedral  School  of 
Gloucester  it  was  reported  that  "the  classical  education 
pursued  here  is  from  the  rudiments  of  Latin  and  Greek  to 
the  extent  of  Sophocles,  Euripides,  etc.,  and  the  best  of 
Latin  authors."  Kingston  in  Hereford  frankly  reported 
that  the  ''general  classical  routine  necessary  for  qualification 
of  youth  for  the  Universities  is  carefully  pursued."  At 
Ashford  in  Kent  "the  master  is  not  required  to  teach  them 
writing  or  arithmetic  or  any  other  branch  of  literature,  ex- 
cept the  Classics."  The  report  from  Wotton  in  Glouces- 
tershire indicates  how  local  conditions  were  modified  ac- 
cording to  the  preferences  of  the  master:  "The  Westmin- 
ster Latin  and  Greek  Grammars  are  used,  and  its  plan  of 
education  is  at  present  pursued,  the  Master  having  formerly 
been  a  scholar  upon  that  Royal  Foundation."  Smaller 
schools  that  did  not  always  carry  the  boy  through  the  upper 
school,  easily  adapted  themselves  to  the  individual  student ; 
at  least  it  would  seem  so  from  the  report  of  High  Wycombe 
(Bucks.),  where  the  Eton  Latin  and  Greek  grammars  were 
used  ''unless  a  boy  is  intended  for  Westminster  or  any 
other  Public  School,  where  other  grammars  are  preferred." 
Sometimes,  however,  the  Regulations  definitely  prescribed 
the  routine,  as  at  Wilton  (Chester),  where  we  find:  "5th  The 
Eton  Grammar,  and  no  other,  shall  be  taught."     Occasion- 

iThis  and  the  following  quotations  are  taken  from  that  in- 
valuable compilation  A  Concise  Description  of  the  Endowed  Gram- 
mar Schools  in  England  and  Wales  by  Nicholas  Carlisle,  two  vol- 
umes, London,  1818. 


180  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

ally  the  master  has  written  the  Latin  and  Greek  grammars. 
This  is  the  case  at  Reading  (Bucks.),  where  the  Rev.  Dr. 
Valpy  was  head  master.  In  his  school  the  system  of  educa- 
tion was  nevertheless  founded  upon  those  of  Westminster, 
Eton,  and  Winchester  "with  such  alterations  as  expedience 
and  locality  render  necessary." 

A  comparison  of  the  authors  a  boy  was  required  to  read 
reveals  no  fixed  number  or  sequence.  ^  The  extensive  drill 
in  Latin  syntax  and  prosody  required  two  lessons  in  the 
morning  and  two  in  the  afternoon,  together  with  evening 
exercises.  English  verses  were  supplied  for  translation  in- 
to Latin.  It  could  not  have  been  the  rule  in  all  schools  to 
supply  the  matter  of  these  verses,  for  there  is  something 
pathetic  in  the  traditional  request  of  the  lower-form  boys, 
'Tlease  give  me  some  sense."  At  Appleby  Parva,  after 
Greek  had  been  taken  up,  the  course  was  arranged  so  as  to 
give  ''Latin  prose  in  the  morning,  and  Latin  poetry  in  the 
afternoon."  Clara  Reeve  reports  (1799)  that  in  a  certain 
school  two  evenings  a  week  were  given  to  reading  English 
classics  so  that  the  boys  might  know  something  of  their  na- 
tive language  while  they  were  learning  the  dead  ones. 
But  she  adds,  ''  a  trouble  that  few  schoolmasters  take  upon 
them."  ^ 

After  he  had  read  Cicero  and  Homer,  the  boy  wrote 
Latin  verses  without  having  the  matter  supplied.  No  doubt 
Cowper  was  thinking  of  prizes  offered  for  excellence  in 
Latin  verse  when  he  wrote  in  Table  Talk  that  at  West- 
minster 

little  poets  strive 
To    set   a   distich    upon    six   and    five. 

1  Compare  in  addition  to  Carlisle,  op.  cit.,  the  Autobiography 
of  Samuel  Johnson. 

2  Destination :  or  Memoirs  of  a  Private  Family  by  Clara  Reeve 
(in  three  volumes,  London,  1799),  vol.  I,  p.  77. 


EDUCATION'  181 

As  a  boy  he  had  been  a  poet  at  Westminster,  and  had  been 
made  ''proud  with  silver  pence."  In  a  letter  to  Unwin  he 
tells  how  in  a  day-dream  he  fancied  himself  aj^ain  at  school 
to  receive  the  reward  of  a  silver  groat  that  was  sent  from 
class  to  class  for  the  admiration  of  fellow  students.  At 
Eton  the  master  granted  a  weekly  half  holiday  if  some  bov 
had  composed  Latin  verses  worthy  of  being  inscribed  in  gilt. 
This  boy  was  sent  up  to  the  master  to  ask  for  the  holiday. 

Saturday  exercises  included  for  the  older  boys  the  trans- 
lation of  the  Catechism  and  the  Thirty-nine  Articles,  "with 
Welchman's  notes,"  into  Latin.  After  the  long  list  of  Latin 
and  Greek  books  and  compilations  the  boy  was  expected  to 
master,  it  sounds  like  grim  irony  to  be  told  that  such  a 
course  "generally  proves  as  much  as  a  Boy's  stay  at  School 
admits  of."  It  is  of  such  extended  formal  drill  in  parsing 
and  conjugation  that  Locke  says,  with  an  eye  to  the  prac- 
tical, "A  great  part  of  the  learning  now  in  fashion  in  the 
schools  of  Europe,  and  that  goes  ordinarily  into  the  round 
of  education,  a  gentleman  may  in  good  measure  be  un- 
furnished with,  without  any  disparagement  to  his  affairs." 
It  is  one  of  the  complaints  of  Cowper  in  Tirocinium 
that  boys  are  kept  at  these  schools  too  long,  with  the  result 
that  the  younger  boys  are  corrupted  by  imitating  the  vices 
of  the  boys  of  sixteen  and  eighteen. 

Schools,  unless  discipline  were  doubly  strong. 

Detain  their  adolescent  charge  too  long; 

The   management  of  tyros   of  eighteen 

Is   difficult,    their   punishment   obscene    (218 — 221). 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  children  were  admitted  to  these  founda- 
tions as  soon  as  they  could  read  the  New  Testament  in 
English,  usually  at  the  age  of  six.  They  might  remain, 
ordinarily,  as  in  the  instance  of  Congleton  (Chester),  "as 
long  as   Parents  please."     Usually   the   statutes   give   "no 


182  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

specific  time  of  superannuation,"  although  at  Hereford 
scholars  might  not  remain  after  sixteen,  and  at  Tiverton 
(Devon)  not  after  eighteen,  while  at  Eton,  boys  are  not  ac- 
ceptable before  eight  or  after  eighteen.  Even  at  Eton, 
then,  the  course  might  drag  out  to  ten  years.  It  is  small 
wonder,  in  view  of  the  lack  of  touch  in  the  curriculum  with 
vital  affairs  of  life,  that  West  should  think  of  boys  as 
wasting  fruitless  hours  while  "hid  in  studious  shades" ;  and 
the  round  from  grammar  to  Latin  verses  and  back  again 
naturally  led  him  to  say  that  "irksome  and  long  the  pas- 
sage was."  Richardson's  opinion  that  "a  great  deal  of  pre- 
cious time  is  wasted  to  little  purpose  in  the  attaining  of 
Latin,"  simply  shows  that  the  novelist  was  at  one  with  the 
poet  and  philosopher  in  their  attack  on  the  classical  curricu- 
lum. 

Churchill's  trenchant  lines  in  The  Author  convey  the 
bitterness  of  his  recollections  of  childhood  days  spent  in 
the  acquisition  of  dead  languages.  He  was  destined  by 
"cruel  parents"  for  the  church  "ere  it  was  known  that  I 
should  learn  to  read."  He  was  made  to  bear  the  "slavish 
drudgery  of  the  schools,"  He  misspent  the  precious  hours 
of  his  youth  in  climbing  the  steep  and  rugged  ascent  of 
learning,  only  to  find  at  the  top  that  it  were  better  to  forget 
the  Httle  he  had  learned  at  the  barren  spot  called  a  school. 
Jago's  Labour  and  Genius  (1768)  contains  vigorous  satire 
on  the  blindness  of  pedagogues.  Jago's  caustic  lines  con- 
demn the  leveling  of  all  natural  talent  in  the  merciless  rou- 
tine of  grammatical  instruction.  The  boy  of  genuine  parts 
has  no  opportunity  of  showing  his  superiority  to  the  dull 
plodder  who  goes  through  prose  and  song  "insensible  of 
all  their  graces,"  and  is  learned  in  words  alone.  Happy 
recollections  of  his  friendship  with  Shenstone  at  Solihul  do 
not  enhance,  even  with  the  lapse  of  years,  the  "painful  toil" 


EDUCATION  183 

and  the  "dull,  tiresome  road"  through  "Priscian's  crabbed 
rules." 

For  the  gloomy  conception  of  the  teaching  profession 
outlined  in  The  Author's  Apology,  Lloyd  might  have  taken 
as  his  theme  the  statement  in  the  Vicar  of  Wakciicld:  "I 
have  been  an  usher  at  a  boarding  school  myself,  and,  may 
I  die  by  an  anodyne  necklace,  but  I  had  rather  be  an  un- 
der-turnkey  in  Newgate."  The  poem  gives  the  impres- 
sions of  a  poet  who  had  been  an  usher  at  Westminster. 
With  the  bitterness  of  his  friend  Churchill  he  writes  that 
if  he  wished  to  avenge  himself  on  his  enemy,  he  could  in- 
flict no  greater  injury  than  to  make  him  a  ''tool  of  learning" 
in  the  form  of  an  usher.  Lloyd  can  not  endure  the  thought 
of  "working  on  a  barren  soil"  and  laboring  incessantly  to 
"cultivate  a  blockhead's  brains." 

Oh !  'Tis  a  service  irksome  more 
Than  tugging  at  the  slavish  oar. 

Yet  such  his  task,  a  dismal  truth, 
Who  watches  o'er  the  bent  of  youth. 

While  earning  a  paltry  stipend,  the  teacher  sees  his  pupils 
prosper  by  use  of  their  talents ;  but  as  for  his  own  progress 
in  learning, 

No   joys,    alas!    his    toil    beguile. 
His  own  lies  fallow  all  the  while. 

The  evidence  of  poets  and  prose  writers  points  clearly  to 
free  use  of  liquor  by  masters  and  ushers.  The  Provost  of 
Eton  in  1781  is  described  as  one  of  the  fat  and  gouty  di- 
vines whose  fondness  for  port  and  cheerful  company  is 
greater  than  his  love  of  education.  Cole,  the  antiquary, 
used  to  have  routs  in  his  college  apartments  at  Eton,  the 
college  court  being  filled  with  carriages  and  tumults  "not 
much  to  the  edification  of  a  place  of  education."  Jenyns 
makes  "vicar"  rhyme  with  "liquor,"  and  every  reader  of 


184  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

eighteenth-century  fiction  knows  what  the  noveHsts  thought 
of  drinking  parsons.  In  Clarissa  Harlozve,  Lord  M.  writes 
to  Lovelace  that  if  he  finds  one  of  his  tenants  sober  on  the 
occasion  of  Lovelace's  marriage,  "Pritchard  shall  eject  him." 
A  study  of  Gillray,  Rowlandson,  and  Hogarth  will  con- 
vince the  most  skeptical  that  Cowper  was  justified  in  his 
statement  that  the  ''government  is  too  much  interested  in 
the  consumption  of  malt  liquor."  When  Defoe  spoke  of 
England  as  a  ''drunken  nation  from  lord  to  tenant,"  he 
probably  thought  also  of  schoolmasters.  Goldsmith  was 
willing  that  schoolmasters  should  puzzle  their  brains  over 
grammar  while  he  drank  good  stout  liquor  that  gave  his 
genius  "better  discerning" ;  but  schoolmasters  also  indulged 
in  the  privilege  of  stimulants.  The  potation  penny  con- 
tributed by  children  at  term  end  was  probably  put  to  the 
use  for  which  it  was  intended.  Johnson's  formula  was 
"claret  for  boys,  port  for  men,  and  brandy  for  heroes." 
Colonel  Jacques  begged  some  beer  to  drink  with  his  bread, 
and  reports  that  the  "good  woman  gave  me  very  freely." 
Locke  held  in  Thoughts  that  the  child's  ''Drink  should  be 
only  Small  Beer."  ^ 

Although  Cowper  mercilessly  flays  the  evils  of  public 
school  education,  he  is  not  primarily  concerned  with  the 
curriculum.  Far  from  objecting  to  the  classics,  he  is  fa- 
vorably disposed  toward  them.  While  not  going  to  the 
length  of  Shaftesbury,  who  fervently  hoped  that  the  time 
would  not  be  long  ere  he  might  change  the  unprofitable 
study  of  "these  moderns  of  ours"  for  a  hearty  application  to 
the  ancients,  or  like  Denham  who  swallowed  his  Greek 
with  the  same  eagerness  as  he  did  water  when  thirsty, 
Cowper  nevertheless  recalls  with  pleasure  how  he  cultivated 

1  Locke's  Some  Thoughts  Concerning  Education,  Section  i6, 
Drink. 


RDl'CATIOX  185 

a  school  taste  for  ancient  poetry,  "catching-  its  ardor  as  I 
mused  along."  Neither  docs  he  join  hands  witli  those  who 
plead  for  a  study  of  the  mother  tongue.  Although  an- 
nouncing himself  as  "no  friend  of  Lily's  Grammar,"  he  con- 
siders it  one  of  his  principal  advantages  as  a  composer  of 
verses  that  he  has  not  read  an  English  poet  "these  thirteen 
years,  and  but  one  these  twenty  years."  His  classroom 
experiences  must  have  been  pleasant,  for  he  reveals  a  fond- 
ness for  school  terminology,  weaving  into  his  lines  in  Co)i- 
vcrsation  such  phrases  as  "prompts  him"  and  "prescribes  his 
theme."  His  genuine  scorn  is  aroused  by  the  "chattering 
train"  of  Fashion,  who  is  aped  in  the  schools.  Cowper  warms 
up  to  his  theme  while  considering  the  spendthrift  boy  whose 
school  expense  "pinches  parents  blue"  and  "mortifies  the 
liberal  hand  of  love.''  He  is  keen  on  the  trail  of  moral 
offenses,  which  he  finds  "where  most  offensive,  in  the  skirts 
Of  the  robed  pedagogue."  ^ 

Cowper's  Tirocinium  (1785)  condemns  schools  chiefly 
on  the  ground  that  the  separation  of  the  boy  from  parental 
ties  destroys  not  only  his  confidence  in  his  father  but  also 
his  ability  to  join  naturally  thereafter  in  the  life  of  the 
home  circle.  This  painful  rupture  is  the  beginning  of  all 
evils,  and  occurs  at  an  early  age  when  the  boy  is  left  to 
the  mercies  of  a  crowded  school  that  can  not  properly 
guard  his  morals  or  guide  him  in  the  right  path.  While 
the  parent  is  absorbed  in  the  careful  breeding  of  colts  and 
puppies,  his  son  is  scampering  at  one  of  "these  menageries" 
which  "all  fail  their  trust."  Thinking  of  his  own  experience 
at  school,  Cowper  concludes  that  "great  schools  suit  best 
the  sturdy  and  the  rough."  One  large  class  of  boys  who  are 
torn  from  home  and  who  are  "at  best  but  pretty  buds  un- 
blown" miss  the  affection  of   father  and  mother,  and  are 

1  The  Task,  Book  II. 


186  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

given  ''by  public  hackneys  in  the  schooHng  trade"  no  better 
nourishment  for  the  growing  mind  than  ''conjugated  verbs, 
and  nouns  declined."  Sound  religion  such  as  the  child  had 
learned  at  home  at  his  mother's  knees  is  sparingly  taught 
while  he  is  crammed  with  "much  mythologic  stuff."  At 
this  point  the  poet  escapes  to  a  footnote  to  guard  against 
misunderstanding.  He  does  "not  mean  to  censure  the 
pains  that  are  taken  to  instruct  a  schoolboy  in  the  religion 
of  the  heathen,  but  merely  that  neglect  of  Christian  culture 
which  leaves  him  shamefully  ignorant  of  his  own."  This 
is  in  harmony  with  Cowper's  specific  theme. 

That  we  are  bound  to  cast  the  minds  of  youth 
Betimes  into  the  mould  of  heavenly  truth, 
That  taught  of  God  they  may  indeed  be  wise, 
Nor  ignorantly  wandering  miss  the  skies   (105 — 108). 

Guided  by  this  thought,  Cowper  views  with  pleasure  the 
home  training  of  the  infant  and  child.  He  is  carried  back  to 
the  "season  of  life's  happy  spring"  by  the  thought  of  that 
ingenious  dreamer  in  whose  "well-told"  story  "sweet  fiction 
and  sweet  truth  prevail."  Bunyan's  name  is  not  mentioned, 
however,  "lest  so  despised  a  name  should  move  a  sneer." 
Bunyan's  Pilgrim's  Progress  would  naturally  be  a  favorite 
with  Cowper  because  it  "guides  the  Progress  of  the  soul 
to  God."  Until  sent  to  the  public  school,  the  child  was  not 
ashamed  to  read  such  books  or  to  begin  and  close  the  day 
with  prayer.  If  the  parent  wishes  to  train  his  boy  to  lose 
these  habits,  which  are  a  "bond  upon  his  heart,"  he  should 
allow  him  to  learn  "loose  expense  and  fashionable  waste" 
with  a  mob  of  boys  at  a  public  school  where  he  will  remain 
childish  in  "mischief  only  and  in  noise"  because  taverns  and 
the  bad  example  of  older  boys  will  there  teach  the  knowledge 
which  school  pedantry  does  not.  The  glory  of  former  ages 
when  schools  bred  poets,  statesmen,  and  divines  has  fled: 


EDUCATION  187 

Our  striplings  shine  indeed,  but  with  such  rays 
As  set  the  midnight  riot  in  a  blaze. 

The  evil  is  heightened  by  the  careless  father  who  regales  his 
sons  with  stories  of  his  schoolboy  adventures,  in  place  of 
emphasizing  the  pleasing  spectacle  of  those  experiences 
which  would  make  him  live  over  again  his  "innocent  sweet 
simple  years"  through  recollection  of  "The  little  ones,  un- 
buttoned, glowing  hot"  in  their  games  at  school,  where  he 
"started  into  life's  long  race." 

Children  whose  expectation  of  riches  or  titles  makes  solid 
worth  an  encumbrance  may  indeed  learn  at  school  a  certain 
pleasing  address  or  personal  carriage,  and  the  scorn  of  all 
delights  but  those  of  sense.  But  the  plebeian,  whose  chief 
distinction  should  be  a  spotless  name,  must  shine  because  of 
"true  desert  or  not  at  all."  What  are  parents  thinking  of, 
then,  if  they  "risk  their  hopes,  their  dearest  treasure,  there?" 
It  is  immoral  to  risk  all  in  order  that  the  child  may  make 
a  titled  friend  by  intercourse  with  young  peers  at  a  great 
public  school.  It  is  "barbarous  prostitution  of  your  son" 
to  proceed  on  the  assumption  that  "The  parson  know'S 
enough  who  knows  a  Duke."  The  poet  scorns  such  boyish 
friendship,  which  can  make  "A  piece  of  mere  church-furni- 
ture at  best."  The  "public  hives  of  puerile  resort"  that  are 
of  most  approved  standing,  owe  their  repute  in  part  at  least 
to  such  sordid  considerations.  The  hope  of  connections 
formed  for  interest  swells  the  great  schools  beyond  a  size 
that  can  be  w^ell  managed.  And  yet  Cowper  does  not  wish 
to  indicate  that  small  schools  are  therefore  to  be  preferred. 
He  will  praise  a  school  as  Pope  has  praised  a  government : 
that  one  is  best  which  is  most  faithfully  administered. 

Few  boys  are  born  with  talents  that  excel, 

But  all  are  capable  of  living  well ; 

Then  ask  not,  whether  limited  or  large? 

But,  watch  they  strictly,  or  neglect  their  charge? 


188  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

If  masters  are  anxious  only  that  the  boy  may  con  his  lessons 
while  they  neglect  his  morals  as  a  "despised  concern/'  the 
great  schools  and  small  deserve  a  common  blame. 

To  the  father  who  is  blessed  with  an  ingenuous  son, 
Cowper  offers  as  substitute  for  a  master,  that  the  parent  be 

Father,   and   friend,   and   tutor,   all   in   one. 

Why  resign  into  a  stranger's  hand  the  task  which  he  is  him- 
self capable  of  performing? 

How ! — turn  again  to  tales  long  since  forgot, 

Aesop,  and  Phaedrus,  and  the  rest? — Why  not? 

He  will  not  blush,  that  has  a  father's  heart, 

To  take  in  childish  plays  a  childish  part. 

But  bends  his  sturdy  back  to  any  toy 

That  youth  takes  pleasure  in.  to  please  his  boy.      (545 — 550) 

What  can  compensate  the  father  for  such  pleasures  to  be 
enjoyed  in  ''domestic  snug  recess?"  Certainly  not  a  son 
whose  heart  has  been  alienated  by  absence  and  by  accomp- 
lishments or  vices  learned  at  school. 

If  the  father's  professional  demands  absorb  all  his  time 
and  energy,  he  may  find  it  expedient  to  engage  a  reliable 
tutor,  who  can  be  his  son's  best  friend  in  domestic  sur- 
roundings. A  capable  tutor,  provided  his  talents  are  re- 
spected in  the  household,  will  increase  a  parent's  delight  in 
his  son  because  discipline  will  be  backed  by  the  love  which 
the  son  would  miss  at  school.  His  mind  will  be  developed, 
but  at  the  same  time  the  parent  may  joy  to  see  "his  morals 
undefiled." 

Cowper  is  so  sensitive  to  sensual  abuses  that  he  offers 
still  another  alternative.  If  the  parent  is  a  worldly  man 
whose  table  is  "indeed  unclean"  with  "discourse  obscene," 
and  if  he  has  a  "polite,  card-playing"  wife  who  is  chained 
to  routs,  so  that  every  day  the  child  sees  in  the  home  what  is 
fatal  to  his  future, 


EDUCATION  189 

Find  him  a  better  in  a  distant  spot, 

Within   some   pious   pastor's   humble   cot. 

Where  vile  example   (yours  I  chiefly  mean. 

The  most  seducing,  and  the  oftenest  seen) 

May  never  more  be  stamped  upon  his  breast, 

Nor    yet    perhaps    incurably    impressed.      (759 — 764) 

There  he  will  grow  strong  in  body  and  soul  under  a  kindly 
and  natural  regimen  of  regular  hours  and  simple  diet.  In- 
stead of  idle  dreaming  of  past  and  future  follies, 

His  virtuous  toil  may  terminate  at  last 
In  settled  habit  and  decided  taste. 

By  presenting  these  ways  out  of  the  dilemma,  Cowper 
decides  the  debate  over  the  comparative  value  of  school  and 
home  education. 

Cowper's  lines  are  addressed  to  the  prosperous  middle 
class  of  Englishmen  (''tenants  of  life's  middle  state") 
whose  undebauched  character  retains  two  thirds  of  all 
English  virtue.  He  calls  upon  them  to  look  about  on  an 
age  "perversely  blind"  in  the  matter  of  education,  and  to 
decide  wisely  in  the  education  of  their  sons.  The  school- 
bred  boy  may  be  virtuous  still,  but  if  so  he  is  the  excep- 
tion, because  in  the  eyes  of  the  poet,  prevailing  manners  of 
loose  taste  and  extravagance  take  their  color  from  the 
schools.     Therefore, 

though  I  would  not  advertise  them  yet. 
Nor  write  on  each — "This  building  to  be  let," 
Unless  the  world  were  all  prepared  to  embrace 
A  plan  well  worthy  to  supply  their  place ; 
Yet.  backward  as  they  are.  and  long  have  been. 
To  cultivate  and  keep  the  MORALS  clean 
(Forgive  the  crime),  I  wish  them,  I  confess, 
Or    better    managed,    or    encouraged    less.      (915 — 922) 

Poetic  attacks  like  those  of  Pope,  West,  and  Cowper 
put  schoolmasters  on  the  defensive.     This  is  clear  from  a 


190  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

prose  treatise  like  Barrow's  Essay  on  Education  (1802), 
which  contains  a  chapter  on  the  comparative  advantages  of 
school  and  home  education.  Although  novelists  and  essay- 
ists of  the  century  confirm  the  evidence  of  poets  on  the  edu- 
cation of  children,  masters  of  schools  tried  to  meet  ob- 
jections raised  on  the  grounds  of  improper  supervision  and 
poor  instruction  due  to  large  numbers.  Barrow  suggests 
that  the  evils  of  domestic  education  can  be  tolerated  only  in 
favor  of  those  who  are  incapacitated  physically  or  mentally. 
It  is  obvious,  however,  that  he  is  holding  a  brief  in  relation 
to  which  he  is  not  a  disinterested  party.  The  evidence  of 
poets  against  endowed  schools  is  supported  down  through 
the  century. 


Poems  based  on  material  drawn  from  village  schools 
were  written  in  a  different  literary  tradition.  The  tendency 
toward  sentimental  and  idyllic  treatment  is  strong  in  all 
poets  who  noticed  the  elementary  or  village  schools.  Such 
humorous  treatments  of  the  earliest  stages  of  education  as 
those  of  Prior  and  Tickell,  which  are  less  common  than  the 
idyllic  treatment  as  exemplified  by  Shenstone's  Schoolmis- 
tress (1742)  and  Goldsmith's  The  Deserted  Village  (1770), 
are  prompted  by  good  nature,  and  not  by  the  biting  satire 
that  inspired  the  lines  of  Churchill  and  Lloyd  on  the  en- 
dowed schools.  Distance  lent  enchantment  to  the  poet's 
representation  of  the  first  stages  of  his  education.  Even 
where  the  problem  of  poverty  in  relation  to  schooling  has 
been  noticed,  as  in  Dyer's  The  Fleece,  we  may  note  the 
same  tendency  to  overlook  harsher  facts.  That  the  problem 
of  providing  common  education  for  the  masses  was  acute 
is  instanced  by  the  fact  that  Brougham's  Committee  in  18 18 
reported  three  thousand  five  hundred  parishes,   in  a  total 


EDUCATION  191 

of  ten  thousand,  without  schools  of  any  kind.  Practical  ef- 
forts to  establish  primary  education  had  been  made  from 
the  last  decade  of  the  seventeenth  century  by  the  Society 
for  the  Promotion  of  Christian  Knowledge.  In  the  eighties 
of  the  eighteenth  century  the  Sunday  School  movement, 
headed  by  Raikes,  had  faced  the  problem  ;  and  the  efforts  of 
Hannah  More  to  establish  schools  at  Cheddar,  have  already 
been  noticed.  The  fact,  however,  is  that  the  elementary 
school  did  not  receive  either  the  amount  or  the  kind  of  prac- 
tical treatment  accorded  to  the  endowed  schools. 

Although  poets  were  on  the  whole  fully  abreast  of  the 
most  advanced  contemporary  educational  ideals  with 
regard  to  endowed  schools  and  the  houses  of  industry,  they 
were  inclined  to  become  conventional  or  sentimental  the 
moment  they  took  up  the  first  period  of  a  child's  education. 
Mention  of  the  hornbook,  for  instance,  is  common  from 
Prior  to  Wordsworth.  Although  the  hornbook  must  have 
been  displaced  in  part  at  least  by  the  spelling-book  before 
the  reign  of  George  II,  references  and  allusions  persist  to 
the  end  of  the  century.  ^  Cowper  was  five  years  old  at  the 
close  of  the  reign,  yet  he  notes  as  late  as  1785  that  parents 
put  a  hornbook  into  the  child's  hand.  They  do  this  to 
please  the  child  at  a  tender  age : 

Tis  called  a  book,  though  but  a  single  page.  - 
Added  to  the  unique  form  and  shape  is  the  quaint  poetic 
flavor  of  the  criss-crow  row  that  is  associated  with  the  horn- 
book.^ 

'   In  Cowpers  Conversation,  alphabets  of  ivory  hold  the  atten- 
tion of  the  unlettered  boy,  who  is 

Sorting  and  puzzling  with  a  deal  of  glee, 
Those  seeds  of  science  called  his  ABC. 
2  Tirocinium. 

"  Compare  the  poem  TJic  Characters  of  the  Christ-Cross  Rozc. 
attributed  to  Thomas  Grav,  Aldine  edition. 


192  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Coming  down  to  the  eighteenth  century  from  medieval 
days,  the  hornbook  has  rightfully  been  called  the  well- 
spring  of  English  education  and  literature : 

All  human  arts  and  every  science  meet 
Within  the  limits  of  thy  single  sheet. 

Few  specimens  have  survived  the  destruction  which  has  be- 
fallen children's  books  A  penny  hornbook  at  a  sale  in 
London  in  1893  brought  the  sum  of  sixty-five  pounds. 

In  Prior's  Alma,  the  English  maid  gives  Master  John 
a  gingerbread  hornbook. 

And,  that  the  child  may  learn  the  better, 

As  he  can  name,  he  eats  the  letter. 

Proceeding  thus  with  vast  delight, 

He  spells,  and  gnaws,  from  left  to  right.      (Canto  //) 

Tickell  gives  a  humorous  account  in  his  Horn-Book : 

Thee  will  I  sing,  in  comely  wainscot  bound. 
And  golden  verge  enclosing  thee  around ; 
The  faithful  horn  before,  from  age  to  age. 
Preserving  thy  invaluable  page ; 
Behind,  thy  patron  saint  in  armour  shines. 
With  sword  and  lance,  to  guard  thy  sacred  lines : 
Beneath  his  courser's  feet  the  dragon  lies 
Transfixed ;  his  blood  thy  scarlet  cover  dyes ; 
Th'  instructive  handle's  at  the  bottom  fixed. 
Lest  wrangling  critics  should  pervert  the  text. 

No  greasy  thumbs  thy  spotless  leaf  can  soil, 
Nor  crooked  dogs-ears  thy  smooth  corners  spoil. 

* 

Scarce  lives  the  man  to  whom  thou'rt  quite  unknown, 
Though  few  th'  extent  of  thy  vast  empire  own.  ^ 

1  Cawthorn's  JVit  and  Learning  (1757)  : 

Here,  puppy !  with  this  penny  get 
A  hornbook  or  an  alphabet ; 
And  see  if  that  licentious  e3'e 
Can  tell  a  great  A  from  an  I  ? 


EDUCATION  193 

Poets  often  refer  satirically  to  the  ignorance  or  illiteracy 
of  the  masses,  without,  however,  inquiring  into  probable 
causes  or  remedies.  V*\  using  the  hornlK)ok  as  his  point 
of  departure,  Tickell  is  exceptional  in  bringing  his  discussion 
of  illiteracy  close  to  the  affairs  of  children.  In  mock  heroic 
vein  he  gives  a  picture  of  the  fond  grandsire  who  was  con- 
soled and  comforted  on  his  deathbed  by  hearing  his  grand- 
son Hodge  pronounce  gravely  the  great  A,  B,  C  of  the 
hornbook.  The  poet  also  notices  the  general  state  of  in- 
ability to  read.  Fame  reports  that  there  are  whole  parishes, 
especially  in  Essex  Hundreds,  in  which  the  hornl^ook  is 
unknown.  It  has  since  been  estimated  that,  in  a  total  of 
five  and  one  half  million  inhabitants  in  1700,  only  thirty 
thousand  children  were  receiving  schooling,  whereas  ac- 
cording to  our  standards  there  should  have  been  nine  hun- 
dred thousand.  ^ 

Although  poets  are  content  to  refer  to  the  hornbook. 
we  know  that  awakened  interest  in  the  study  of  the  mother 
tongue  resulted  in  the  publication  of  spelling-books  and 
grammars.  In  Mandeville's  Essay  on  CJianty  Schools  we 
find  in  addition  to  references  to  the  criss-cross  row  (Christ- 
Cross  Row),  allusions  to  heaps  of  spelling-books  and 
primers ;  and  publishers'  announcements  contain  such  titles 
as  The  Child's  First  Book.  In  Defoe's  Complete  English 
Gentleman  we  find  speculations  on  the  advantage  of  spelling 
the  "beautifullest  and  best  improved  language  in  the  world." 
As  early  as  1699  the  board  of  the  Society  for  the  Promotion 
of  Christian  Knowledge  gave  a  hearing  to  Mr.  Synions,  a 
schoolmaster  of  Cripplegate,  who  had  announced  the  dis- 
covery of  the  secret  of  teaching  twenty  to  thirty  boys  the 
alphabet  in  a  day's  time. 

1  Consult  D.  Salmon's  The  Education  of  the  Poor  in  the  Eigh- 
teenth Century. 


194  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

In  actual  business  practice  we  find  that  during  the  first 
quarter  of  the  century  masters  were  frequently  bound  to 
teach  apprentices  to  write.  Stipulations  to  this  effect  are 
frequent  in  Sheffield  about  1715.  The  Manuscript  Inden- 
tures at  Corsham  contain  a  memorandum  concerning  Peter 
Bush,  who  was  bound  on  May  20,  1706:  "it  was  agreed 
before  sealing  hereof  by  all  parties  therein  concerned  that 
the  said  William  Goodwyn  shall  teach  his  said  apprentice  to 
write  -well  before  he  is  forth  of  his  time."  ^ 

In  spite  of  the  wide  interest  in  grammar,  children  could 
not  have  benefited  much,  because  poor  spelling  was  common 
among  all  classes  in  town  and  country.  Although  Wilkie 
takes  offense  at  his  "degenerate  age  of  lead"  for  its  belief 
that  Shakespeare  could  not  read,  his  biographer  says  that 
"deeply  learned  as  he  was,  Wilkie  could  neither  read  nor 
spell  correctly."  Chatterton  in  Kew  Gardens  observes  that 
it  is  doubtful  if  Bristol  aldermen  can  read;  while  Lloyd 
states  that  not  one  in  twenty  will  succeed,  for  "Consider, 
sir,  how  few  can  read."  It  is  to  be  expected  that  Cowper's 
"rural  carvers"  would  try  to  immortalize  themselves  in 
"characters  uncouth  and  spelt  amiss";  but  we  are  hardly 
prepared  for  the  evidence  of  illiteracy  among  men  and 
women  of  station  in  life.  In  Clarissa  Harlozue  there  is 
this  appeal:  "Dear,  dear  sir!  if  I  am  to  be  compelled!  let  it 
be  in  favor  of  a  man  that  can  read  and  write."  And  later, 
in  connection  with  a  wretchedly  spelled  letter  from  Solmes, 
Clarissa  says :  "he  can  read  and  write  as  well  as  most  gentle- 
men, I  can  tell  you  that" ;  while  in  Pamela  there  is  comment 
on  the  nobility  to  the  effect  that  Lord  Davers's  nephew 
"spells  most  lamentably."  The  same  situation  appears  with 
even  greater  emphasis  with  regard  to  women.  In  Clarrisa 
Harloive  there  is  the  comment:  "So,  the  honest  girl  is  ac- 

^  See  O.  J.   Dunlop's  English  Apprenticeship  and  Child  Labor. 


EDUCATION  195 

cepted — of  good  parentage — but,  through  a  neglected  educa- 
tion, plaguy  illiterate:  she  can  neither  write,  nor  read  wait- 
ing." Defoe's  observations  on  female  education  are  that 
girls  are  taught  to  read,  "and  perhaps  to  write  their  names 
or  so,  and  that  is  the  height  of  a  woman's  education."  Gay 
passes  off  a  bad  speller  with  the  comment  "like  a  court  lady 
though  he  write  and  spell." 

The  education  of  girls  was  of  course  in  general  not  as 
careful  as  that  of  Swift's  Stella.  In  the  elementary  schools, 
girls  were  taught  chiefly  to  sew  and  knit,  so  as  to  fit  them  for 
service,  this  being  the  attitude  even  in  the  time  of  Hannah 
More's  Cheddar  Schools  at  the  close  of  the  century.  It  is 
therefore  not  merely  witty  of  Chesterfield  to  admonish  his 
son  that  ''Inaccuracies  in  orthography,  or  in  style,  are  never 
pardoned  but  in  ladies."  Walpole  recalls  how  the  younger 
Duchess  of  Marlborough  "exposed  herself  by  placing  a 
monument  and  silly  epitaph,  of  her  owm  composition  and 
bad  spelling,  to  Congreve,  in  Westminster  Abbey."  It 
would  seem  from  all  evidence  that  the  primitive  and  cer- 
tainly inadequate  hornbook  could  not  have  been  an  effective 
medium  for  teaching  more  than  the  alphabet,  and  that  the 
shoals  of  mothers'  assistants  did  not  perform  their  mission 
adequately. 

The  same  impulse  that  stirred  poets  to  recall  lovingly 
their  early  acquaintance  with  the  hornbook,  led  them  also 
to  remember  with  affection  the  village  schoolmistress. 
Rural  surroundings  and  her  own  simple  ways  fitted  in  easily 
with  an  idyllic  conception  of  early  childhood  as  a  happy, 
carefree  time.  Sympathetic  pictures  of  the  dame's  school 
occur  as  late  as  Henry  Kirke  White's  Cliilciliood,  which 
notices  how  the  "village  matron  kej)t  her  little  school";  and 
Crabbe  is  stirred  to  write  lines  that  breathe  sympathy  and 
love  in  The  Parish  Register  ( 1807)  : 


196  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  pious  mistress  of  the  school  sustains 

Her  parents'  part,  nor  their  affection   feigns, 

But  pitying  feels;   with  due  respect  and  joy, 

I  trace  the  matron  at  her  loved  employ.      (Part  /) 

The  poet  of  realism  might  here  have  written  with  char- 
acteristic bareness  of  detail,  for  later  governmental  in- 
vestigation and  debates  in  Parliament  are  not  colored  by 
sentiment.  We  hear  of  gray-haired  dames  whose  chief 
recommendation  is  their  poverty.  A  member  quoted  a 
dame  as  saying:  ''It's  little  they  pays,  and  it's  little  we 
teaches  them."  Macaulay,  while  speaking  in  the  Commons 
in  1847,  refers  to  teachers  of  both  sexes  in  elementary 
schools  as  the  "refuse  of  the  callings,"  and  contends  that  they 
do  ''not  know  whether  the  earth  is  a  cube  or  a  sphere."  Yet 
whatever  their  shortcomings,  village  schools  were  the  sub- 
ject of  sentimental   treatment   from   Shenstone   to   Crabbe. 

The  schoolmistress  fared  better  than  the  schoolmaster. 
Burns,  who  was  quick  to  sense  sham  and  pretension  in  the 
dignitaries  of  his  acquaintance,  has  left  a  not  too  pleasing 
record  of  schoolmasters.  As  a  result  of  Burns's  satire  in 
Death  and  Dr.  Hornbook  (1785),  John  Wilson,  parish 
schoolmaster  at  Tarbolton,  was  compelled  to  relinquish  his 
teaching.  The  bad  conditions  from  whic^h  elementary  edu- 
cation suffered,  become  clear  from  a  perusal  of  this  "true 
story."  Wilson  at  the  same  time  conducted  the  parish 
school  and  a  small  grocery  shop,  where  in  addition  to  com- 
modities he  sold  drugs  and  gave  medical  advice.  In  the 
words  of  Burns:  "This  gentleman,  Dr.  Hornbook,  is  pro- 
fessionally a  brother  of  the  sovereign  order  of  the  ferula ; 
but,  by  intuition  and  inspiration,  is  at  once  an  apothecary, 
surgeon,  and  physician." 

Much  of  the  characteristic  wit  of  Burns  went  into  the 
composition  of  the  not  wholly  complimentary  Epitaph  for 


EDUCATION  197 

Mr.   William  Micliic,  schoolmaster  of  Cleish   Parish,  Fife- 
Here  lie  Willie  Michie's  hones; 

O  Satan,  when  ye  tak  liim, 
Gie    him    the    schulin    o'    your    weans, 

For  clever  deils  he'll  mak  them! 

Byrom's  Epitaph  (written  in  chalk  on  the  t^rarc-stouc  of  a 
profligate  schoohiiastcr)  also  credits  its  subject  with  more 
skill  than  ability. 

Here  lies  John  Hill. 
A  man  of  skill. 

His  age  was  five  times  ten : 
He  ne'er  did  good, 
Nor  ever  wou'd, 

Had  he  lived  as  long  again. 

It  is  not  necessary  for  the  purpose  of  this  study  to  ex- 
amine details  that  constitute  the  dififerences  between  the 
earlier  and  later  versions  of  Shenstone's  Schoolmistress. 
In  the  mood  of  Tickell,  when  that  poet  deigned  to  notice  the 
humble  hornbook,  and  in  the  spirit  of  Gay's  Trivia,  Shen- 
stone  in  1737  published  The  Schoolmistress  in  a  volume  of 
Poems  for  friends.  Although  The  Schoolmistress  was  in- 
tended to  produce  a  humorous  effect,  the  reading  public  took 
it  seriously,  as  in  the  instance  of  Gay's  Shepherd's  Week, 
and  enjoyed  its  imagery.  As  it  is  generally  known,  Shen- 
stone's poem  was  published  in  the  revised  form  of  1742. 
Although  the  dame  is  the  central  figure,  Shenstone  is  writ- 
ing from  the  point  of  view  of  the  children. 

The  sentiment  with  which  he  strove  to  suffuse  his  lines 
does  not  lead  him  to  ignore  wholly  the  shortcomings  of  the 
village  school.  In  a  pensive  mood  he  observed  the  unworld- 
liness  and  simplicity  of  schoolmistress  and  scholars ;  but 
his  train  of  sentiments  is  based  on  direct  observation.  He 
"fairly  drew  his  picture  from  the  spot."  In  the  spirit  of  his 
ajre  he  feared  that  this  attention  to  lowlv  life  would  be  "im- 


198  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

puted  to  an  entire  ignorance."  But  it  was  this  "fondness 
for  his  native  country"  and  the  fact  that  he  did  not  **counter- 
feit  the  scene"  which  drew  the  praise  of  Wordsworth,  who 
would  back  the  schoolmistress  in  her  garden  or  in  her  chair 
before  the  cottage  door.  Shenstone,  in  fact,  has  sketched 
sufficient  details  to  make  possible  a  reconstruction  of  many 
of  the  features  of  a  rural  elementary  school.  If  the  ad- 
vertisement calls  attention  to  the  sentimental  strain  of  the 
poem,  ("a  peculiar  tenderness  of  sentiment")  the  quotation 
from  Virgil  emphasizes  its  realistic  details : 

And  mingled  sounds  and   infant  plaints  we  hear, 
That  pierce  the  entrance  shrill,  and  wound  the  tender  ear. 

The  opening  stanzas  reflect  Shenstone's  endeavor  to 
combine  idyllic  elements  with  details  of  direct  observation. 
Shenstone's  heart  is  forlorn  ''full  sorely"  to  think  how  mo- 
dest worth  lies  neglected  in  the  dull  shades  of  obscurity. 
Then  follows  the  setting,  which  is  not  wholly  idyllic: 

In  every  village  marked  with  little  spire, 
Embowered    in    trees,    and    hardly   known   to    Fame, 
There  dwells  in  lowly  shed,  and  mean  attire, 
A  matron  old,  whom  we  Schoolmistress  name; 
Who  boasts  unruly  brats  with  birch  to  tame; 
They  grieven  sore,  in  piteous  durance  pent. 
Awed  by  the  power  of  this  relentless  dame; 
And  oft-times,  on  vagaries  idly  bent, 
For  unkempt  hair,  or  task  unconned,  are  sorely  shent. 

The  birch  tree  under  whose  wide-waving  branches  the 
school  is  sheltered,  boded  ill  to  pupils,  whose  "pulse  beat 
low"  when  the  wind  rustled  in  its  leaves.  Another  stanza 
elaborates  a  guarded  protest  against  flogging,  under  the 
image  of  a  scarecrow  that  frightens  innocent  birds.  The  sen- 
timent which  redounded  to  the  protection  of  animals,  and  a 
feeling  for  their  hardships,  led  Shenstone  to  notice  also  the 
hardships  of  childhood. 


EDUCATION  199 

The  dame's  scrupulous  cleanliness  is  reflected  in  her 
simple  attire.  Her  cap  was  whiter  than  the  driven  snow,  and 
her  apron  showed  as  delicate  a  blue  as  the  harebell.  She 
w^ore  a  russet  kirtle  of  her  own  weaving.  Her  pupils  were 
ranged  about  her  in  "gaping  wonderment"  and  "pious  awe." 
She  could  not  be  accused  of  a  love  for  pompous  titles,  but 
''held  right  dear"  the  names  bestowed  upon  her:  "Goody, 
good-woman,  gossip,  n'aunt,  or  dame."  Like  many  a  par- 
son and  schoolmaster  of  the  eighteenth  century,  she  was 
something  of  an  apothecary  or  herbalist,  for  she  disdained 
mere  painted  flowers,  and  cultivated  in  her  garden  only 
"herbs  for  use  and  physic" ;  the  "pungent  radish,  biting  in- 
fant's tongue"  found  its  place  with  "marjoram  sweet"  and 
lavender  for  "kerchief  clean."  On  a  Sunday  evening  she 
sat  before  her  door,  singing  Sternhold's  hymns,  or  in  her 
summer  seat  in  the  garden  retailed  Bible  stories.  She 
admonished  children  when  they  were  present,  and  held  her 
sway  over  them  when  they  were  out  of  her  sight,  for  she  was 
warned  of  all  their  doings : 

if  little  bird  their  pranks  behold, 
'Twill  whisper  in  her  ear,  and  all  the  scene  unfold. 

These  idyllic  passages  are  interwoven  with  lines  of  a 
more  sombre  and  forbidding  cast.  Like  White's  dame  at 
the  end  of  the  century,  Shenstone's  schoolmistress  is  more 
formidable  in  the  schoolroom  than  without ;  and  the  poet 
does  not  hesitate  to  portray  her  in  the  panoply  of  her  office. 
Her  elbows-chair  is  like  the  chair  "of  Scottish  stem"  in 
which  the  sovereign  is  crowned. 

And  in  her  hand,   for  sceptre,  she  does  wield 
Tway   birchen    sprays;    with    anxious    fear   entwined, 
With  dark  distrust,  and  sad  repentance  filled  ; 
And  stedfast  hate,  and  sharp  affliction  joined, 
And  fury  uncontrouled,  and  chastisement  unkind. 


200  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Without  her  vested  power  to  mete  out  punishment  to  "re- 
belUous  breasts"  by  applying  the  "baleful  sprig/'  there 
would  be  no  "comely  peace  of  mind,  and  decent  order"  in 
English  cottages.     Clothed  with  such  power 

sits  the  dame,  disguised  in  look  profound. 
And  eyes  her  fairv-  throng,  and  turns  her  wheel  around. 

After  a  stately  command  from  her,  the  urchins  take  their 
books  in  hand.  One  luckless  wight  is  found  contemplating 
the  picture  of  St.  George  and  the  Dragon  instead  of  the 
criss-cross  row.  The  dame  looses  his  brogues,  and  "levels 
well  her  aim.''  Discipline  evidently  depended  not  on  love 
and  leading,  but  on  fear,  for  the  dame  must  flog  "Till  fear 
has  taught  them  a  performance  meet."  Shenstone's  analysis 
of  the  child  mind  in  this  flogging  scene  shows  that  he  was 
writing  with  his  eye  on  the  object.  There  is  an  especially 
convincing  bit  of  psychological  analysis  in  the  stanzas  that 
trace  the  fluctuations  of  emotion  in  the  sister  of  the  boy  who 
is  being  flogged.  Outside  of  Blake's  poetry,  this  is  the 
most  extended  passage  that  attempts  the  portrayal  of  chil- 
dish emotion.  The  continued  obstinacy  of  the  boy  after  he 
has  been  sent  to  the  corner,  where  he  stands  with  one  fist 
in  his  mouth  and  the  other  in  his  hair,  and  his  stolid  refusal 
to  be  moved  by  the  dame's  cajolery  and  her  offering  of 
cakes,  are  well  done.  But  the  passage  is  no  more  vivid  than 
the  analysis  of  the  little  sister's  reaction  to  her  brother's 
peril  and  disgrace. 

All  playful  as  she  sate,  she  grows  demure : 
She  finds  full  soon  her  wonted  spirits  flee ; 
She  meditates  a  prayer  to  set  him  free: 
Nor  gentle  pardon  could  this  dame  deny 
(If  gentle  pardon  could  with  dames  agree) 
To  her  sad  grief  that  swells  in  either  eye. 
And  wrings  her  so  that  all  for  pity  she  could  dye. 


EDUCATION  201 

No  longer  can  she  now  her  shrieks  command ; 
And  hardly  she  forbears,  through  awful  fear. 
To  rushen  forth,  and  with  presumptuous  hand. 
To   stay   harsh   Justice    in    its    mid   career. 
(Ah!  too  remote  to  ward  the  shameful  blow!) 
She  sees  no  kind  domestic  visage  near. 
And  soon  a  flood  of  tears  begins  to  flow  ; 
And  gives  a  loose  at  last  to  unavailing  woe. 

When  Shenstone  moralizes  this  hit  of  photographic 
reahsm,  there  is  a  suggestion  of  romantic  protest  against 
repression  and  the  dead  leveling  of  pupils  which  was  so 
obnoxious  to  his  schoolmate  Jago  at  Solihul.  We  are  told 
that  the  dame  knew  how  to  thwart  the  proud  and  raise  the 
submissive  child :  but  the  poet  sounds  a  warning,  neverthe- 
less, against  the  indiscriminate  policy  of  repression  common 
in  all  schools.  The  regimen  of  fear  is  easily  abused  by 
authority  in  power  over  the  little  ones.     Therefore 

Beware,  ye  dames,  with  nice  discernment  see. 
Ye  quench  not  too  the  sparks  of  nobler  fires : 
Ah!  better  far  than  all  the  Muses'  lyres. 
All  coward  arts,  is  Valour's  generous  heart ; 
The  firm  fixt  breast  which  fit  and  right  requires. 
Like  Vernon's  patriot  soul!  more  justly  great 
Than   Craft   that  pimps   for   ill,  or   flowery   false    Deceit. 

He  sees  a  little  bench  of  bishops,  a  chancellor  in  embryo, 

or  a  poet  who, 

Though  now  he  crawl  along  the  ground  so  low, 

Nor  weeting  how  the  Muse  should  soar  so  high. 

Wisheth.  poor  starveling  elf!  his  paper  kite  may  fly. 

Children  should  be  "nursed  with  skill"  while  at  school ;  for 
"dazzling  fruits  appear"  only  when  dames  teach  "with  sa- 
gacious foresight." 

The  poem  closes  in  a  pensive  strain,  after  an  idyllic  pas- 
sage on  the  fruits  and  Shrewsbury  cates  that  tempt  chil- 
dren freed  from  school  to  part  with  their  pennies. 


202  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Ah  !  midst  the  rest,  may  flowers  adorn  his  grave, 
Whose  art  did  first  these   dulcet  cates  display! 
A  motive  fair  to  Learning's  imps  he  gave, 
Who  cheerless  o'er  the  darkling  region  stray; 
Till  Reason's   morn   arise,  and   light   them   on   their   way. 

Shenstone  is  preoccupied  with  children  whose  ages  range 
from  three  to  six  years.  His  schoolmistress  must  have 
combined  with  her  school  duties  some  of  the  functions  of 
a  day-nurse.  x\cross  the  open  doorway  of  the  school  is  an 
"imprisoning-board" 

Lest  weakly  wMghts  of  smaller  size  should  stray; 
Eager,  perdie,  to  bask  in  sunny  day ! 

The  dame's  "ancient  hen," 

Which,  ever  and  anon,  impelled  by  need, 
hito  her  school,  begirt  with  chickens,  came. 

further  emphasizes  the  lack  of  organization  and  school  at- 
mosphere according  to  our  standards  of  elementary  school 
procedure.  In  fact,  in  spite  of  the  poet's  conscious  effort  to 
suffuse  the  whole  with  tenderness  and  sentiment,  much  of 
which  was  no  doubt  true  to  his  recollections  of  Sarah  Lloyd 
and  her  school  at  Llalesowen,  he  adhered  closely  to  the 
spirit  of  the  motto.  Whatever  the  idyllic  charm  of  the 
setting  and  the  picturesque  dame  in  her  garden  or  at  her 
cottage  door,  she  is  not,  in  the  light  of  modern  ideals,  at- 
tractive in  her  schoolroom.  It  is  not  a  schoolroom  full  of 
happy,  interested,  responsive  youngsters  whose  activities  are 
lovingly,  if  scientifically,  evoked  by  a  sympathetic  teacher 
who  has  been  trained  to  an  understanding  of  the  child  mind. 
The  fleeting  glimpses  which  Godsmith  vouchsafes  of  the 
village  school  at  Sweet  Auburn  (in  The  Deserted  Vil- 
lage, 1770)  are  seen  through  a  haze  of  sentiment  that  does 
not  wholly  obscure  harsh  facts.  The  school  was  as  bare 
and    ill    regulated    as    that   of    Shenstone's    schoolmistress. 


EDUCATIOX  203 

Though  the  master  was  "skilled  to  rule,"  the  poet  does  not 
obscure  the  fact  that  the  little  school  was  a  "noisy  man- 
sion." The  rule  of  fear  by  fJo^-.c^ing  lay  at  the  heart  of  his 
pedagogy.  Goldsmith's  interest  is  chiefly  in  the  school- 
master, who  is  seen  through  the  eyes  of  his  pupils,  and  then 
as  reflected  in  the  admiration  of  the  gazing  rustics.  They 
wonder  how  one  small  head  could  carry  all  he  knew.  But 
with  the  clownish  admiration  is  bound  up  the  unwhole- 
some fear  of  his  pupils,  for  he  was  '*a  man  severe"  and 
"stern  to  view."  The  "boding  tremblers"  had  learned  to 
foretell  the  day's  disasters  in  his  "morning  face,"  and  were 
not  above  laughing  at  his  many  jokes  wnth  "counterfeited 
glee."  They  were  sensitive  to  the  "dismal  tidings"  im- 
plied in  his  frowns.  ^  Goldsmith,  who  reveals  no  interest 
in  the  problems  of  the  village  school,  but  rather  emphasizes 
the  picturesque  figure  of  the  schoolmaster  who  heightens  the 
efifect  of  the  idyllic  background  of  happy  village  simplicity, 
nevertheless  bears  w^itness  to  the  fact  that  the  schoolmaster 
was,  if  anything,  harsher  and  more  intolerant  than  the 
schoolmistress. 

About  the  age  of  fourteen,  White  composed  his  poem 
Childhood,  which  is  colored  by  the  melancholy  that  w-as 
characteristic  of  his  temperament  and  led  to  his  belief  that 
childhood  also  drinks  of  "the  bitter  cup  of  care."  The 
school  in  which  he  first  entered  the  "low  vestibule"  of  "learn- 
ing's fane"  w^as  a  cottage  over  whose  mouldering  walls  the 
mantling  woodbine  crept.  There  the  "village  matron  kept 
her  little  school."  She  is  like  Shenstone's  schoolmistress  in 
her  neat  habits  and  industry,  and  is  individualized  by  her 
use  of  spectacles. 

1  Compare  Charles  Lamb's   Christ's  Hosf^ital  Fkr  and   Thirty 
Years  Ago. 


204  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Faint  with  old  age,  and  dim   were  grown  her  eyes, 
A  pair  of  spectacles  their  want  supplies ; 
These  does  she  guard  secure,  in  leathern  case. 
From  thoughtless  wights,  in  some  unweeted  place. 

She  was  gentle  of  heart,  but  like  Goldsmith's  schoolmaster 
knew  how  to  rule.  When  the  poet  was  "harshly"  reproved 
before  he  had  become  inured  to  alphabetic  toils,  he  crept 
back  to  his  corner  broken-hearted,  and  wept  while  thoughts 
of  "tender  home"  passed  through  his  mind.  But  out  of 
school  hours,  he  and  his  schoolmates  gathered  about  the 
dame's  wheel  at  the  door  of  her  cottage  to  wonder  "how 
'twas  her  spinning  manufactured  cloth."  Children  did  not 
fear  her  at  such  times,  "for  out  of  school  she  never  knew 
to  chide." 

Crabbe  admired  Shenstone's  Schoolmistress,  and  in  The 
Parish  Register  has  genuinely  graced  the  humble  theme  by 
throwing  a  halo  of  sanctity  and  self-sacrifice  about  the 
"pious  mistress."  iln  what  he  calls  a  digression  from  the 
story  of  Dawkins  and  his  orphaned  children,  he  draws  a 
sympathetic  picture  of  the  matron  who  assumed  the  care 
of  the  youngest  orphan.  He  chooses  the  moment  at  the 
close  of  a  summer  day  when  she  has  dismissed  her  charges, 
and  "frugal  of  Hght"  sits  knitting  before  her  cottage  door, 
and  "of  time  as  frugal"  reads  her  Bible  while  she  knits. 
"In  pure  respect"  the  village  lads  "walk  silent  on  the  grass" 
when  they  observe  her  as  she  closes  the  day  with  prayer. 

Crabbe  had  but  scant  respect  for  the  poor  discarded 
Clelia  who  finally  attempted  to  eke  out  a  living  as  matron. 
The  terse  comment  with  which  he  dismisses  her,  that  "na- 
ture gave  not  talents  fit  for  rule,"  again  serves  to  emphasize 
the  fact  that  the  inculcation  of  fear  was  the  chief  object  of 
the  discipline  of  a  village  schoolmistress  (The  Borough, 
Letter  XV). 


EDUCATION  205 

Crabbe's  heartfelt  lines  on  the  "letter-loving  danic"  who 
had  taught  him  his  letters,  but  who  was  in  the  closing  years 
of  her  life  dependent  on  the  charity  of  her  former  charges, 
shows  that  the  teacher  in  a  dame's  school  was  often  held 
in  high  respect.  She  had  inoculated  her  pupils  with  the  con- 
viction that  "learning  is  better  worth  than  house  or  land." 
Half  the  wealthy  and  weighty  men  who  rule  the  borough 
"own  the  matron  as  the  leading  cause"  of  their  success  in 
life.  Because  they  feel  the  "pleasing  debt,"  she  is  not  com- 
pelled to  close  her  useful  life  in  a  crowded  institution  of 
charity,  by  implication  the  fate  of  many  dames ;  but 

To  her  own  house  is  borne  the  week's  supply ; 
There  she  in  credit  lives,  there  hopes  in  peace  to  die. 

The  poet's  further  personal  tribute  lovingly  recalls  in  detail 
the  pains  she  took  with  him  in  the  first  steps  of  learning. 

Can  I  mine  ancient  Widow  pass  unmoved? 
Shall   I  not  think  what  pains  the   matron  took. 
When  first  I  trembled  o'er  the  gilded  book? 
How  she,  all  patient,  both  at  eve  and  morn. 
Her  needle  pointed  at  the  guardian  horn ; 
And  how  she  soothed  me,  when,  with  study  sad, 
I  laboured  on  to  reach  the  final  zad? 

(The  Borough,  Letter  XVII) 

Such  tributes  are  exceptional  in  our  period.  iWhen  we 
recall  the  lines  of  Pope  on  the  masters  of  the  great  endowed 
schools,  and  West's  arraignment  not  only  of  their  methods, 
but  also  of  their  personal  habits,  together  with  the  strictures 
of  Langhorne,  Lloyd,  and  Jago,  it  is  refreshing  to  come  upon 
Lovibond's  tribute  to  his  classical  master.  Lovibond  eulo- 
gizes him  in  at  least  three  poems.  Johnson  says  that  "the 
initiatory  part  of  his  education  Edward  Lovibond  received 
from  the  Rev.  Mr.  Woodeson,  of  Kingston,  upon  Thames, 
for  whom  he  ever  retained  an  almost  filial  affection:  a  cir- 


204  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Faint  with  old  age,  and  dim   were  grown  her  eyes, 
A  pair  of  spectacles  their  want  supplies ; 
These  does  she  guard  secure,  in  leathern  case, 
From  thoughtless  wights,  in  some  unvveeted  place. 

She  was  gentle  of  heart,  but  like  Goldsmith's  schoolmaster 
knew  how  to  rule.  When  the  poet  was  "harshly"  reproved 
before  he  had  become  inured  to  alphabetic  toils,  he  crept 
back  to  his  corner  broken-hearted,  and  wept  while  thoughts 
of  "tender  home"  passed  through  his  mind.  But  out  of 
school  hours,  he  and  his  schoolmates  gathered  about  the 
dame's  wheel  at  the  door  of  her  cottage  to  wonder  "how 
'twas  her  spinning  manufactured  cloth."  Children  did  not 
fear  her  at  such  times,  "for  out  of  school  she  never  knew 
to  chide." 

Crabbe  admired  Shenstone's  Schoolmistress,  and  in  The 
Parish  Register  has  genuinely  graced  the  humble  theme  by 
throwing  a  halo  of  sanctity  and  self-sacrifice  about  the 
"pious  mistress."  [In  what  he  calls  a  digression  from  the 
story  of  Dawkins  and  his  orphaned  children,  he  draws  a 
sympathetic  picture  of  the  matron  who  assumed  the  care 
of  the  youngest  orphan.  He  chooses  the  moment  at  the 
close  of  a  summer  day  when  she  has  dismissed  her  charges, 
and  "frugal  of  light"  sits  knitting  before  her  cottage  door, 
and  "of  time  as  frugal"  reads  her  Bible  while  she  knits. 
"In  pure  respect"  the  village  lads  "walk  silent  on  the  grass" 
when  they  observe  her  as  she  closes  the  day  with  prayer. 

Crabbe  had  but  scant  respect  for  the  poor  discarded 
Clelia  who  finally  attempted  to  eke  out  a  living  as  matron. 
The  terse  comment  with  which  he  dismisses  her,  that  "na- 
ture gave  not  talents  fit  for  rule,"  again  serves  to  emphasize 
the  fact  that  the  inculcation  of  fear  was  the  chief  object  of 
the  discipline  of  a  village  schoolmistress  (The  Borough, 
Letter  XV). 


EDUCATION  205 

Crabbe's  heartfelt  lines  on  the  "letter-loving  dame"  who 
had  taught  him  his  letters,  but  who  was  in  the  closing  years 
of  her  life  dependent  on  the  charity  of  her  former  charges, 
shows  that  the  teacher  in  a  dame's  school  was  often  held 
in  high  respect.  She  had  inoculated  her  pupils  with  the  con- 
viction that  "learning  is  better  worth  than  house  or  land." 
Half  the  wealthy  and  weighty  men  who  rule  the  borough 
"own  the  matron  as  the  leading  cause"  of  their  success  in 
life.  Because  they  feel  the  "pleasing  debt,"  she  is  not  com- 
pelled to  close  her  useful  life  in  a  crowded  institution  of 
charity,  by  implication  the  fate  of  many  dames ;  but 

To  her  own  house  is  borne  the  week's  supply ; 
There  she  in  credit  lives,  diere  hopes  in  peace  to  die. 

The  poet's  further  personal  tribute  lovingly  recalls  in  detail 
the  pains  she  took  with  him  in  the  first  steps  of  learning. 

Can  I  mine  ancient  Widow  pass  unmoved? 
Shall   I  not  think  what  pains  the   matron  took. 
When  first  I  trembled  o'er  the  gilded  book? 
How  she,  all  patient,  both  at  eve  and  morn. 
Her  needle  pointed  at  the  guardian  horn; 
And  how  she  soothed  me,  when,  with  study  sad, 
I  laboured  on  to  reach  the  final  zad? 

(The  Borough,  Letter  XVII) 

Such  tributes  are  exceptional  in  our  period.  iWhen  we 
recall  the  lines  of  Pope  on  the  masters  of  the  great  endowed 
schools,  and  West's  arraignment  not  only  of  their  methods, 
but  also  of  their  personal  habits,  together  with  the  strictures 
of  Langhorne,  Lloyd,  and  Jago,  it  is  refreshing  to  come  upon 
Lovibond's  tribute  to  his  classical  master.  Lovibond  eulo- 
gizes him  in  at  least  three  poems.  Johnson  says  that  "the 
initiatory  part  of  his  education  Edward  Lovibond  received 
from  the  Rev.  Mr.  Woodeson,  of  Kingston,  upon  Thames, 
for  whom  he  ever  retained  an  almost  filial  affection :  a  cir- 


206  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

cumstance  which  is  equally  honorable  to  the  pupil  and  the 
preceptor."  Lovibond's  Verses  (ziritten  after  passing 
through  Findon,  Sussex,  1768)  are  addressed  to  his  master, 
who  was  born  at  Findon.  Lovibond's  genuine  respect  for 
his  teacher  becomes  clear  in  this  graceful  tribute.  In  the 
perennial  eighteenth-century  discussion  of  the  comparative 
merits  of  domestic  and  school  education,  such  a  personal 
tribute  gives  concrete  evidence  of  the  success  of  private 
tuition. 

His  master  "was  one  of  those  amiable  beings  whom 
none  could  know  without  loving.  To  the  abilities  of  an 
excellent  scholar  was  united  a  mind  so  candid,  so  patient, 
so  replete  with  universal  benevolence,  that  it  glowed  in 
every  action.  His  life  was  an  honor  to  himself,  to  religion, 
to  human  nature.  He  preserved  to  his  death  such  simplicity 
of  manners  as  is  rarely  to  be  met  with.  He  judged  of  the 
world  by  the  standard  of  his  own  virtuous  heart;  and  few 
men  who  had  seen  such  length  of  days  ever  left  it  so  little 
acquainted  with  it."  The  unworldly  qualities  of  his  master 
stand  out  against  the  unpleasant  characteristics  emphasized 
in  the  poetry  of  the  period : 

Thou  wert  not  born  to  plough  the  neighbouring  main. 
Or  plant  thy  greatness  near  Ambition's  throne ; 

Or  count  unnumbered  fleeces  on  thy  plain: 

— The  Muses  loved  and  nursed  thee  for  their  own! 

And  twined  thy  temples  here  with  wreaths  of  worth, 

And  fenced  thy  childhood  from  the  blights  of  morn, 

And  taught  enchanting  song,  and  sent  thee  forth 
To  stretch  the  blessing  to  an  age  unborn. 

In  the  poem  he  wrote  upon  the  occasion  of  his  former  mas- 
ter's house  being  converted  into  a  poor-house,  Lovibond 
recalls  the  "gracious  children,  and  the  faithful  wife"  who 
welcomed  him  at  their  "social  board."  There  in  "Simplici- 
ty's abode" 


EDUCATIOX  207 

the  good  teacher  held  hy  turns  to  youth 
The  blaze  of  fiction  and  pure  light  of  truth, 
Who,  less  by  precept  than  example  fired. 
Glowed  as  he  taught,  inspiring  and  inspired. 

Lovibond  writes  of  nature  polished  by  "classic  art" ;  yet  the 
virtue  of  the  place  lies  in  its  having  been  in  his  day  "Sim- 
plicity's abode," 

Where  smiling  Innocence  looked  up  to  God ; 

Where   Nature's  genuine  graces   charmed   the   heart. 

Th€  influence  of  Rousseau  is  clear  also  in  the  Dedication 
of  Julia's  Letter: 

0  thou  who  sitst  in  academic  schools. 

Less  teaching  than  inspiring  ancient  art, 
Thy  own  example  nobler  than  their  rules, 

Thy  blameless   life  best  lesson   for   the  heart.  ^ 

In  1798  Lancaster's  Borough  Road  School  advertised  ad- 
vanced doctrine  with  which  many  elementary  schools  in 
Great  Britain  have  not  caught  up  even  today.  -  In  that  school, 
honorary  orders  of  merit  were  worn  until  they  were  for- 
feited  by   misbehaviour,   the   ''forfeiture   being   in    lieu    of 

1  Compare  William  Whitehead's   To   the  Rev.  Dr.  Louth: 

So  let  me  still  with  filial  love  pursue 
The  muse  and  parent  of  my  infant  thought. 
From  whence  the  color  of  my  life  I  drew, 
When  Bigg  presided,  and  when  Burton  taught. 

-  Compare  Dr.  Johnson's  remarks  on  Mr.  Hunter,  his  head- 
master: "He  used  ...  to  beat  us  unmercifully;  and  he  did  not 
distinguish  between  ignorance  and  negligence ;  for  he  would  beat  a 
boy  equally  for  not  knowing  a  thing,  as  for  neglecting  to  know  it." 
But  he  also  said  of  him :  "My  master  whipt  me  very  well.  Without 
that,  Sir,  I  should  have  done  nothing."  Concerning  Dr.  Rose's 
lenient  methods,  Johnson  remarked :  "There  is  now  less  flogging  in 
our  great  schools  than  formerly,  but  then  less  is  learned  there;  so 
that  what  the  boys  get  at  one  end  they  lose  at  the  other."  ( Bos- 
well's  Johnson). 


208  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

corporal  punishment."  Less  than  five  years  after  this  an- 
nouncement, Barrow  was  irritated  by  observing  that  some 
schools  preferred  not  to  flog.  He  contends  that  the  acqui- 
sition of  learning  must  always  be  laborious  and  that  only 
the  authority  of  the  teacher  can  confine  his  pupil  to  irk- 
some and  continued  application.  By  authority  he  means 
flogging :  ''Yet  perhaps  without  the  use  or  the  fear  of  it  not 
a  single  scholar  was  ever  made."  With  such  doctrine  de- 
liberately promulgated  even  during  the  liberalizing  age  of 
romanticism,  it  is  small  wonder  that  Fielding,  who  had  a 
tender  feeling  for  Eton,  should  associate  his  schooldays 
there  with  the  birch  rod:  'To  thee  at  thy  birchen  altar 
with  true  Spartan  devotion  have  I  sacrificed."  ^  Cowper 
characterizes  school  life  as  the  "whip-gig  state"  in  Hope, 
and  in  Th£  Valediction  alludes  to  Colman, 

Thy  schoolfellow  and  partner  of  thy  plays 

(Where)    Nichol   swung  the  "birch   and  twined  the  bays. 

In  The  Progress  of  Error  he  is  more  explicit : 

Plants  raised  with  tenderness  are  seldom  strong, 
Man's  coltish  disposition  asks  the  thong, 
And  without  discipline  the   favourite   child. 
Like  a  neglected  forester,  runs  wild. 

The  poets,  however,  do  not  as  a  rule  treat  the  custom  of 
flogging  with  the  lightheartedness  of  the  great  novelist. 
Chatterton's  indignant  infant  muse  would  give  advice  to  men 
when  it  calls  the  education  of  his  day  the  "offspring  illegi- 
timate of  Pain,"  an  accusation  hardly  stronger  than  West's 
condemnation  of  persecuting  "free-created  souls  with  penal 
terror's  awe." 

1  Compare  Tom  Jones:  for  Partridge,  the  barber  and  school- 
master; and  also  for  Thwackum.  Note  also  Smollett's  diverting 
paragraphs  on  flogging  in  Peregrine  Pickle,  and  his  delineation  of 
schoolmasters  and  tutors  in  Keypstick,  Jennings,  and  Jolter. 


EDUCATION  209 

The  evidence  of  poets  that  educational  methods  are  co- 
ercive rather  than  directive  is  corroborated  by  the  statutes 
of  endowed  and  other  schools.  The  ordinances  of  Chigwell 
School  (Essex)  direct,  "That  for  speaking:  En<::^lish  in  the 
Latin  School,  the  Scholar  be  corrected  with  the  Ferula :  and 
for  swearing,  with  the  Rod."  The  Regulations  at  Witton, 
near  Northwitch  (Chester),  stipulate:  "3rd  In  inflicting  per- 
sonal chastisement,  he  shall  use  only  the  Cane,  except  in 
cases  of  gross  misbehaviour,  when  the  Trustees  must  be 
consulted  as  to  any  other  punishment."  The  "P.  W."  note 
which  explains  the  "dreadful  wand"  held  by  the  spectre  in 
the  Dunciad,  informs  the  reader  it  was  "a  cane  usually  borne 
by  Schoolmasters,  which  drives  poor  souls  about  like  the 
wand  of  Mercury."  That  the  elementary  schools  were 
conducted  according  to  the  doctrine  of  fear  finds  an  almost 
amusing  illustration  in  the  Reports  of  the  Society  for  Bet- 
tering the  Condition  of  the  Poor:  "Both  of  the  mistresses  are 
enjoined  to  treat  the  children  tenderly ;  and  not  to  use  the 
rod,  except  in  cases  of  necessity.  But,  in  order  to  reconcile 
their  young  minds  to  flogging,  when  necessary,  several 
sayings  of  King  Solomon  are  put  in  a  conspicuous  part  of 
the  schools,  and  read  once  a  quarter,  so  as  to  attract  their 
attention  and  shew  them  the  advantage  of  their  being  whipt." 

The  reactionary  Somerville  does  not  frown  upon  such 
pedagogical  methods,  but  takes  it  as  a  matter  of  course  that 
Gamaliel  "with  ruling  rod  trains  up  his  babes  of  grace." 
His  observations  are  good  natured  and  tolerant,  although 
he  realizes  that  genius  can  not  be  forced  in  the  schools.  It 
is  very  plain  that  an  ape  can  not  be  made  an  alderman,  even 
by  the  redoubtable  master  at  Westminster. 

But,  by  your  leave,  good  doctor  Freind, 

* 

When  maggots  once  are  in  the  brain. 
Whole  loads  of  birch  are  spent  in  vain.  ' 
^   The   Fortunc-IIuntcr. 


210  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  conservative  Doctor  Johnson  unsuccessfully  de- 
fended Hastie,  schoolmaster  of  Campbelltown,  by  contend- 
ing that  "no  scholar  had  gone  from  him  either  blind  or  lame, 
or  with  any  of  his  limbs  or  powers  injured  or  impaired." 
And  Cowper  wrote  that  a  person  who  obstinately  held  to 
"mulish  folly"  and  would  not  be  reclaimed  by  softer  meth- 
ods, must  be  made  ashamed.  Poets  in  general,  however, 
showed  nothing  but  indignation  or  contempt  for  flogging. 
In  Carnzuorth  School  (1769)  Graeme  speaks  of  rescuing 
"Defenceless  childhood  from  the  scourge  of  age."  Jenyns 
may  contend  that  sages  must  be  "cudgelled  into  sense,"  but 
in  The  Dean  and  the  Squire  Mason  can  not  understand  the 
educational  value  of  physical  punishment  when  a 

Pedantic  schoolmaster  like  York, 
Thrashes  the  wretch  with  grammar's  flail, 
To  mend  his  head  corrects  his  tail ; 
And  this  with  most  despotic  inry, 
Heedless  of  mercy,  law.  and  jury. 

In  The  Fortune-Hunter,  Somerville  observed  the  same  facts 
in  a  more  tolerant  mood : 

His  bum  was  often  brushed,  you'll  say; 
'Tis   true;    now   twice,    then   thrice   a    day: 
So  leeches  at  the  breech  are  fed. 
To  cure  vertigos  in  the  head. 

Pope's  satiric  muse  in  the  Diinciad  did  not  overlook  the 
possibilities  of  the  situation  for  a  poetic  castigation  of  school 
methods : 

The  pale  Boy-Senator  yet  tingling  stands. 

And  holds  his  breeches  close  with  both  his  hands.      {U^) 

Cawthorn's  lines  in  Wit  and  Learning  (1757)  suggest  the 
direct  and  brutal  attack  of  a  master : 

I'll  lay  thee,  miscreant !  on  my  knee. 

And  paint   such   welks  thy   naked   seat   on, 

As  never  truant  felt  at  Eton. 


EDUCATION  211 

Clara  Reeve,  who  is  usually  liberal  in  her  opinions  on 
education,  says  of  a  certain  pedago^i^ue  that  "he  was  indeed 
too  apt  to  use  the  rod,  which  was  the  ensign  of  his  authority, 
and  made  the  boys  rather  fear  than  love  him."  Her  sym- 
pathies are  clearly  with  the  pupil.  She  found  Arthur,  who 
had  been  severely  flogged,  kicking  his  book  before  him  ("it 
was  Lily's  Grammar")  while  "his  heart  heaved,  his  color 
rose,  and  he  burst  into  tears."  ^ 

Byrom  was  sufficiently  enlightened  to  realize  that  fear 
of  the  rod  would  not  induce  a  sincere  love  of  learning : 

Homer,  Virgil,   Horace!    (if  you  ask) 

Why,  yes,  the  rod  would  send  me  to  my  task; 

But  all  the  consultation  that  came  out 

Had  its  own  end — to  'scape  the  whipping  bout.  - 

Barrow  observed  in  1802  that  many  masters  of  private 
schools  had  published  essays,  presumably  on  pedagogical 
subjects,  the  sole  aim  of  which  was  to  advertise  their  schools. 
S.  Johnson's  Educatian  (1771),  a  poem  in  two  parts,  illus- 
trates how  one  master  skilfully  combined  the  traditional  at- 
titude toward  the  classics  with  the  new  spirit  manifest  in 
poets  who  noticed  school  affairs.  S.  Johnson's  poem  de- 
rives from  Pope's  Dunciad  in  its  protest  against  flogging 

1  Destination,  vol.  i,  p.  y2. 

2  Epistle  to  a  Friend. — In  the  Spectator  (1711)  Steele  writes: 
"I  am  confident  that  no  boy  who  will  not  be  allured  to  letters  with- 
out blows,  will  ever  be  brought  to  anything  with  them.  A  great 
or  good  mind  must  necessarily  be  the  worse  for  such  indignities." 
It  was  repugnant  to  Steele  that  boys  should  kneel  to  a  blockhead 
because  of  a  false  Latin  quantity.  In  later  life  he  still  dreamed  of 
his  master  once  a  month  and  could  not  forget  his  bloody  schoolboy 
hand.  (Compare  Pope's  "Till  birch  shall  blush  with  noble  blood 
no  more";  and  "dropping  with  infant's  blood.")  Steele  goes  on  to 
say  that  "if  you  can  disarm  them  of  their  rods,  you  will  certainly 
have  your  old  age  reverenced  by  all  the  young  gentlemen  of  Great 
Britain  who  are  now  between  seven  and  seventeen." 


212  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

and  repression,  and  at  the  same  time  serves  to  advertise 
the  author  as  a  progressive  who  is  acquainted  with  Rous- 
seau. The  edition  of  1771  artfully  serves  the  purposes  of 
poetry,  pedagogy,  and  publicity. 

S.  Johnson  conducted  a  school  in  Shrewsbury,  where  he 
gave  his  pupils  instruction  in  "Language,  History,  Geo- 
graphy, and  in  the  use  of  Globes  .  .  .  the  French  lan- 
guage, and  Drawing  in  all  its  branches,  on  the  most  reason- 
able terms."  His  poem  is  very  plainly  an  advertisement  of 
his  school ;  it  closes  with  an  unmistakable  ad  captan- 
dum  to  the  ladies,  who  as  fond  mothers  and  aunts  would 
exert  no  inconsiderable  influence  in  the  choice  of  a  school. 
This  point  of  view,  however  unfavorable  to  art,  is  valuable 
as  indicating  the  pedagogical  attitude  which  a  capable 
master  considered  attractive  to  the  clientele  of  his  school.  ^ 

S.  Johnson's  classical  attainments  are  displayed  in  foot- 
notes by  means  of  quotations  from  Sappho,  Lucretius,  Pliny, 
Cireco,  Juvenal  and  others  who  are  made  to  support  his 
trite  observations  on  life.  To  show  that  he  is  at  the  same 
time  abreast  of  his  generation,  he  quotes  also  from  Rouss- 
eau's Emile  (1762).  Rousseau's  works  were  translated  as 
soon  as  published,  and  were  widely  known  through  reviews 
in  the  magazines.  Emile  commanded  the  attention  of  Eng- 
lish readers  everywhere,  to  arouse  opposition,  ridicule,  or,  at 
times,  partial  approval.-  Rousseau's  return  to  nature  was 
readily  assimilated  because  it  was  in  harmony  with  contem- 
porary English  thought.  Johnson  shows  unmistakably  that 
in  his  mind  the  idea  of  giving  child  nature  free  play  in 
education  is  connected  with  Rousseau.     After  condemning 

1  S.  Johnson  is,  of  course,  not  the  great  Samuel  Johnson. 

-  Compare  Observations  on  Mr.  Rousseau's  New  System  of 
Education  with  some  remarks  on  the  different  translations  of  that 
celebrated  work.  In  a  letter  to  a  friend  .  .  .  London,  Cadell,  1763. 
— See  also  Jacques  Pons,  op.  cit.,  passim,  for  additional  titles. 


RDUCATIOX  213 

the  attitude  of  parents  who  force  a  booby  son  into  one  of 
the  learned  professions,  Johnson  calls  attention  to  the  sinewy 
limbs  and  simple  mind  that  "nature  for  other  purposes  de- 
signed." The  word  nature  carries  an  asterisk  that  refers 
the  reader  to  Rousseau's  Emilc:  V^oulez-vous  toujours  etre 
bien  guide?  Suivez  toujours  les  indications  de  la  Nature." 
He  develops  his  thought  by  indicating  how  many  a  strong- 
limbed  man  curses  his  meddling  parents  for  having  forced 
him  to  enter  a  profession  in  which  he  starves  by  his  pen, 
when  he  was  "gifted  with  nerves  the  manly  axe  to  wield." 

List  then,  oh  list,  ye  fools,  to  Nature's  voice. 
Thwart  not  her  dictates,  but  indulge  her  choice. 
She  plainly  shews  you  where  her  bias  leans, 
And,  for  the  end  she  aims  at,  yields  the  means  : 
Be  not  less  rational  than  brutes,  whose  young 
Receive  what  culture  doth  to  brutes  belong. 

The  italicized  phrase  had  Nature  been  obeyed  occurs  four 
times  in  tweny-five  consecutive  lines.  He  advises  the  teach- 
er that  nature  should  be  the  "cynosure  by  which  he  steers." 
Yet  Johnson,  like  all  true  Britishers  since  the  fourteenth 
century,  is  suspicious  of  anything  that  comes  out  of  France. 
He  expresses  a  fine  scorn  for  the  "mamma"  who  fetched 
two  tutors  out  of  France,  one  to  teach  the  child  to  mock 
English  manners  and  to  garnish  his  skull  while  leaving  the 
mind  undisturbed,  and  the  second  to  teach  the  child  to  jab- 
ber French  before  he  quits  his  go-cart — ^with  the  result  that 
the  child's  brain  has  been  neglected  while  his  morals  have 
been  corrupted.  ^  Johnson's  anti-Gallic  attitude  is  as  ob- 
vious as  that  of  Mrs.  Trimmer  and  Mrs.  Sherwood,  al- 
though he  does  not  take  the  anti-Rousseau  attitude  of  Clara 

^  Cp.   Cawthorn's  Equality  of  Human   Conditions    ("spoken  at 
the  annual  visitation  of  Tunbridge  School,   1746")  : 

While   airy   Belville,   guiltless   of   a    school, 
Shines  out  a  French  edition  of  a  fool. 


214  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Reeve  (1799).  In  Destination  she  illustrates  her  point  by 
relating  a  story  that  shows  the  fruits  of  an  education  such  as 
that  advocated  by  ''John  James  Rousseau" :  "I  relate  this 
true  story  as  an  antidote  to  the  poisonous  doctrine  lately  in- 
culcated, that  children  are  neither  to  be  contradicted  nor 
corrected." 

S.  Johnson's  poem  is  both  an  obvious  and  typical  illus- 
tration of  the  severe  limitations  with  which  Rousseau's 
doctrines  were  received  in  England.  When  Johnson,  near  the 
close  of  his  poem,  favors  guiding  the  child  according  to  his 
natural  gifts,  ''with  tender  hand  to  rear  the  infant  state," 
he  again  supports  his  line  with  a  quotation  from  Emile. 
But  he  loses  himself  immediately  in  the  traditional  pedagogy 
devised  for  the  institutional  child : 

Support  its  weakness,  ere  it  run  to  waste, 

To   lop   the    rampant   shoot,   which    strong  and    rude 

Warps  it  from  all  that's  beautiful  and  good ; 

To  touch  the  mind  with  emulation's  flame, 

With  ridicule,  or  keener  sense  of  shame. 

His  long  quotations  from  the  Dnnciad,  and  the  constant  and 
vehement  denunciation  of  flogging,  indicate  that  the  influen- 
ces working  on  him  were  essentially  native  English.  It 
was  modern  in  1771  to  show  an  acquaintance  with  Emile, 
and  the  doctrine  of  following  nature  was  beginning  to  be 
accepted.  However  limited  the  application  of  Rousseau's 
doctrines,  they  nevertheless  had  a  liberating  influence  that 
accelerated  the  native  tendency  away  from  the  nar- 
row classical  curriculum  and  all  its  abuses.  The  ideal  Pre- 
ceptor is  one  who  knows 

The  manners  of  each  circling  age ; 
To  bend  not  break  their  Minds;  their  little  rage 
And  humors  hit;  their  passions  how  to  stir; 
When  to  exert  the  rein,  when  use  the  spur; 
For   different   Minds   a   different   treatment   ask. 


EDUCATION  215 

Rousseau's  ideal  method  of  teaching  by  example  and 
guidance  is  favorably  noticed.  This  was  the  least  radical 
of  Rousseau's  contentions.  Yet  even  here  Johnson  can  not 
break  away  from  traditional  methods ;  for  where  he  con- 
demns flogging  in  the  first  part  (The  Pedant),  he  considers 
it  proper  when  used  with  discretion,  and  defends  it  with 
limitations  in  the  second  part  (The  Preceptor).  In  reality 
his  objection  is  not  to  flogging,  but  rather  to  the  manner  of 
administering  the  beating  indiscriminately  for  the  most  tri- 
vial offenses. 

See  innocence  arraigned  before  his  throne 

For  some  slight  error  of  the  brain  alone. 

Half  dead  with  shame,  abashed,  appalled  he  stands ; 

Grief  drowns  his  voice,  while  terror  lifts  his  hands. 

Lo,  on  his  knees  the  little  suppliant  falls, 

In  piercing  cries  for  mercy,  mercy  calls. 

Oh  hear  him,  hear  him,  and  for  once  receive. 

Once  taste  that  heavenly  pleasure  to  forgive. 

"No,  let  him  smart"  replies  the  unfeeling  clod, 

"He  spoils  the  child  who  spares  the  rod." 

Oh,  maxim  ill  applied.  ^ 

1  Henry  Brooke,  author  of  The  Fool  of  Quality  (1766),  would 
under  any  but  prevailing  conditions  not  have  introduced  the  tutor 
of  the  boys  as  Mr.  Vindex,  the  symbol  of  whose  office  is  "that  tree 
whose  bare  name  strikes  terror  through  all  our  seminaries  of  learn- 
ing." Brooke  does  not  hesitate  to  draw  the  character  of  this  vin- 
dictive example  of  eighteenth-century  pedagogue  in  strong  terms: 
"Mr  Vindex  began  to  assume  a  more  expanded  authority,  and  gave 
a  free  scope  to  the  surly  terrors  of  his  station."  And  again  :  "The 
next  day  Mr.  Vindex  returned,  doubly  armed,  with  a  monstrous 
birch-rod  in  one  hand,  and  a  ferule  in  the  other."  From  the  author's 
apostrophies  on  the  wrongheadedness  of  this  pedagogue,  and  from  the 
details  of  the  story,  one  may  get  a  fairly  accurate  conception  of  "the 
three  accustomed  strokes." — Compare  Tom  Jones  (Book  III,  Chap- 
ter VI)  :  "Castigo  te  non  quod  odio  habeam,  sed  quod  Amem.  I 
chastise  thee  not  out  of  hatred,  but  out  of  love." — In  Roderick  Ran- 
dom the  boys  bind  and  beat  their  master  in  the  schoolroom. 


216  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

As  is  clear  from  poetry  since  the  Dunciad,  most  peda- 
gogues are  wholly  repressive  in  their  methods.  S.  Johnson 
carries  on  the  protest  against  the  clan,  and  can  find  no 
word  strong  enough  to  express  his  contempt.  The  following 
words  appear  in  rapid  succession — ''mercenary,"  "pedant," 
''leaden  crown,"  "meanest  of  the  flogging  train,"  "the 
Thwackum  of  my  age,"  "tigers  and  wolves  have  more  hu- 
manity," "from  their  limbs  their  tender  skin  you  tear," 
"barbarian,"  "caitiff,"  "scorpion." 

But  for  the  herd  of  pedagogues, — I  know 
Not  any  such  pernicious  weeds  that  grow; 
Like  other  weeds  too,  they  aspire  to  curb 
The    kindly   progress    of    each    other    herb. 

Lancaster's  attempt  to  abolish  corporal  punishment  rep- 
resents a  master's  liberal  views  after  the  influence  of  Rous- 
seau had  made  itself  felt  in  England.  Schoolboys  them- 
selves finally  rebelled,  as  in  the  instance  of  Wordsworth's 
friend  Matthews,  who  had  attended  the  Merchant  Tailors' 
School  where  he  had  taken  part  in  a  revolt  that  led  to  the 
abolition  of  flogging  in  that  institution.  In  general,  how- 
ever, the  practice  continued  into  the  nineteenth  century,  and 
was  defended  by  Doctor  Arnold  of  Rugby.  He  still  believed 
in  the  "natural  inferior  state  of  boyhood,"  and  held  that  ob- 
jections to  flogging  originate  in  "that  proud  notion  of  per- 
sonal independence  which  is  neither  reasonable  nor  Chris- 
tian, but  essentially  barbarian."  Dickens,  who  was  a  true 
friend  of  children,  and  broke  many  a  lance  in  their  defense, 
was  able  after  1830  to  find  fourteen  types  of  coercion  for 
discussion  in  connection  with  his  exposure  of  abuses  in 
English  schools.  ^ 

Early  in  the  century  Isaac  Watts  had  recognized  the 
value  of  gentleness  and  kindness  in  the  guidance  and  edu- 

^  Dickens  as  an  Educator  by  James  L.  Hughes. 


EDUCATIOX  217 

cation  of  children.  lie  was  quick  to  recognize  these 
quahties  in  a  schoolmaster  like  his  friend  Thomas  Rowe,  to 
whom  he  addressed  the  poem  To  the  much-houourcd  Mr. 
Thomas  Roz^'c,  the  Director  of  my  Youthful  Studies.  But 
whereas  he  praises  Rowe  for  the  qualities  Lovibond  saw  in 
Woodeson,  much  of  the  emphasis  is  still,  because  of  the 
age  in  which  the  poem  was  written,  on  the  negative  element 
of  protest  against  the  binding  customs  and  magic  chains  of 
the  schools.  Berkeley,  on  the  other  hand,  leaves  Europe  be- 
hind as  hopelessly  old  and  fixed  in  her  ways.  In  Verses 
on  the  Prospect  of  Planting  Arts  and  Learning  in  America, 
written  about  1726,  and  published  in  1752.  he  looks  to  the 
new  w^orld,  youthful  and  strong,  to  redress  the  educational 
grievances  of  the  old  world.  He  would  make  a  new  start 
that   is   impossible   under  prevailing  conditions   in   Europe. 

In  happy  climes,  the  seat  of  Innocence, 

Where   nature   guides    and   virtue    rules. 

Where  men  shall  not  impose  for  truth  and  sense 
The    pendantry    of    courts    and    schools: 

There  shall  be  sung  another  golden  age. 

The  rise  of  empire  and  of  arts, 
The  good  and  great  inspiring  epic  rage. 

The  wisest  heads  and  noblest  hearts. 
Not  such  as  Europe  breeds  in  her  decay; 

Such  as  she  bred  when  fresh  and  young, 
When  heavenly  flame  did  animate  her  clay. 

Although  no  practical  reforms  seem  to  have  been  made  in 
the  schools,  poets  had  definitely  cleared  the  way  for  Words- 
worth's statement  of  a  plan  for  national  education  of  the 
masses.  Wordsworth's  denunciation  of  the  state's  neglect 
of  its  children  is  no  stronger,  however,  than  his  strictures  on 
the  educational  fads  reflected  in  the  many  systems  of  home 
education    which   were   devised    to   take    the   place   of   the 


218  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

discredited  established  curriculum  before  the  days  of  na- 
tionally supervised  common  schools.  To  understand  his 
attitude  toward  the  education  of  children,  it  is  essential 
to  note  the  comment  of  poets  on  books  and  reading  matter 
for  children. 


CHAPTER  V 

CHILDREN'S  BOOKS 

Except  for  William  Blake's  Songs  of  Innocence,  litera- 
ture intended  for  children  is  as  dreary  at  the  close  as  at  the 
opening  of  the  century.  Various  forces  at  work  through- 
out the  century,  but  with  special  vigor  at  the  opening  and 
close,  had  as  their  avowed  object  the  making  over  of  the 
child  according  to  preconceived  ideas  and  plans  of  a  moral 
and  religious  nature.  The  Society  for  the  Promotion  of 
Christian  Knowledge  had  as  its  province  the  inculcation  of 
religious  and  moral  precepts  among  children  of  the  Estab- 
lishment and,  in  many  instances,  of  dissenting  communities 
also.  The  restless  activities  in  dissenting  circles  had  as 
their  chief  object  the  salvaging  of  the  souls  of  children 
from  the  grip  of  the  Devil  and  all  his  forces.  During  the 
last  quarter  of  the  century,  the  results  of  awakened  inter- 
est in  scientific  matters  were  painfully  obvious  in  literature 
intended  for  children.  These  publications  reveal  clearly  a 
tendency  to  secularize  subject  matter,  but  in  method  show 
a  propagandist  spirit  that  had  as  its  objective  the  making 
over  of  the  child  into  a  young  savant.  In  other  words,  the 
child  at  the  close  of  the  century  was  still  nurtured  on  the  in- 
stitutional plan.  Where  Isaac  Watts  in  the  first  quarter 
had  been  stimulated  by  religious  ideals,  Mrs.  Barbauld, 
Aikin,  Day,  and  the  Edgeworths  in  the  last  quarter  were  in 
addition  fired  by  enthusiasm  for  moral  tales  which  incor- 
porated natural  science.  Even  Newberry,  in  the  middle  of 
the  century,  was  not  altruistic  in  combining  the  functions 
of  a  publisher  of  children's  books  with  those  of  a  dispenser 
of  patent  medicines :  and  his  stories  had  also  their  reward 


220  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

for  virtue,  and  punishment  for  evil.  Unfortunately,  Blake's 
peculiar  methods  of  publication  restricted  his  audience  to 
such  an  extent  that  his  delightful  lyrics  for  children  could 
not  seriously  compete  with  less  worthy  publications. 

While  Prior  was  developing  complimentary  verse  on 
childhood  to  its  highest  perfection  in  the  classicist  manner, 
and  while  Swift  was  composing  stinging  satires  on  the  me- 
chanical use  of  childhood,  non-confonnist  writers  were  car- 
rying on  propaganda  from  which  emerged  in  1720  the 
Divine  Songs  for  Children  and  Moral  Songs  of  Isaac 
Watts.  For  a  proper  understanding  of  this  epoch-making 
contribution  to  poetry  on  childhood,  it  is  necessary  to  notice 
briefly  the  religious  and  social  environment  from  whioh  it 
sprang. 

The  characteristic  mood  of  the  non-conformists  was  one 
of  gloom.  The  doctrine  of  election  led  them  to  practice 
introspection  in  order  to  discover  conformity  with  the 
wishes  of  God.  They  feared  the  wrath  of  God  because  of 
their  sinful  nature.  Original  sin  was  more  than  a  doctrine ; 
it  was  a  grim  reality  that  stood  between  them  and  eternal 
salvation.  Like  Donne  and  his  followers  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  they  were  preoccupied  with  death  and  the  grave. 
In  their  essentially  ascetic  outlook,  the  life  of  the  senses 
was  an  evil  to  be  avoided  if  they  wished  to  escape  hell  fire. 
They  did  not  allow  themselves  even  the  natural  love  of 
children,  "those  tempting  things."  At  the  end  of  the  first 
section  of  Watts's  Horae  Lyricae  are  certain  poems  "pe- 
culiarly dedicated  to  Divine  Love."  The  first  of  the  group 
has  the  title  The  Hazard  of  Loving  the  Creatures.  Watts 
pursues  the  argument  that  whatever  love  is  given  to 
friends  and  relatives  leaves  so  much  less  for  God.  Men 
must  control  natural  instincts  in  the  interests  of  salvation. 
This  is  especially  necessary  in  relation  to  children. 


CHILDKEX'S    UOOKS  221 

Nature  has  soft  and  powerful  bands, 

And  Reason  she  controls; 
While  children  with  their  little  hands 

Hang  closest  to  our  souls. 

Thoughtless    they    act    th'    old    Serpent's    part : 

What  tempting  things  they  be! 
Lord,  how  they  twine  about  our  heart, 

And  draw  it  off  from  thee ! 

Face  to  face  with  grim  spiritual  realities,  it  was  essential 
that  man  should  fight  sin  at  the  source.  Salvation  was 
conditioned  upon  the  realization  of  one's  sinful  nature.  In 
his  thirty-ninth  sermon,  on  the  Right  Improvement  of  Life, 
Watts  warns  his  congregation  that  "this  is  the  time  that 
was  given  you  for  your  reconciliation  with  God,  and  secur- 
ing your  everlasting  interest.  All  the  elect  are  born  into 
this  world  sinful  and  miserable.  .  .  .  We  are  all,  by  na- 
ture .  .  .  under  sentence  of  condemnation."  The  child  is 
born  sinful ;  therefore  it  must  be  made  to  realize  the  pre- 
carious state  in  which  it  lives.  It  becomes  the  duty  of 
parents  to  instruct  their  children.  The  growing  soul  of  the 
parent,  doubled  in  wedlock,  and  multiplied  in  children. 

Stands  but  the  broader  mark  for  all  the  mischiefs 
That  rove  promiscuous  o'er  the  mortal  stage. 

That  parents  might  not  become  slack  in  this  fundamental 
matter,  clergymen  exhorted  them  in  sermons,  and  as  prac- 
tical helps  wrote  manuals  for  use  with  children.  It  is  at 
this  point  that  we  meet  Janewa\-  in  the  seventeentli  century 
and  Watts  in  the  eighteenth.  ' 

1  See  John  Ashton's  Social  Life  in  the  Reign  of  Queen  Anne. 
vol.  I,  p.  184.  Ashton  quotes  from  the  lost  and  found  columns  of 
a  periodical:  "Taken  from  a  child,  a  gold  chain  with  this  motto. 
Memento  Mori." 


222  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

As  the  writer  of  this  study  holds  in  his  hand  a  Uttle  yel- 
low book,  wrinkled  and  faded  with  age,  there  rises  from 
its  pages  a  spirit  of  earnestness  and  rigid  duty — a  gloomy 
sincerity  of  purpose.  It  was  written  by  James  Janeway, 
and  is  entitled  A  Token  for  Children,  being  an  exact  ac- 
count of  the  conversion,  Holy  and  Exemplary  Lives  and 
Joyful   Deaths   of  Several    Young    Children  (  1671-1672). 

In  this  little  manual  for  children,  Janeway  appeals  to 
parents:  'Take  some  time  daily  to  speak  a  little  to  your 
children  one  by  one  about  their  miserable  condition  by  na- 
ture. I  know  a  child  that  was  converted  by  this  sentence 
from  a  godly  schoolmistress  in  the  country :  'Every  mother's 
child  of  you  are  by  nature  children  of  wrath.'  Put  your 
children  upon  learning  their  catechism,  and  the  Scriptures, 
and  getting  to  pray  and  weep  by  themselves  after  Christ." 
Janeway  is  sufficiently  specific  and  picturesque  to  command 
attention :  ''And  dare  you  neglect  so  direct  a  command  ? 
Are  the  souls  of  your  children  of  no  value?  Are  you  will- 
ing that  they  should  be  brands  of  hell  ?  'x\re  you  indifferent 
whether  they  be  damned  or  saved?  Shall  the  devil  run 
away  with  them  without  control?  Will  you  not  use  your 
utmost  endeavor  to  deliver  them  from  the  wrath  to  come?" 
And  he  proceeds  more  directly  to  children  themselves  by 
stating,  "They  are  not  too  little  to  die.  .  .  .  They  are  not 
too  little  to  go  to  hell."  Example  One  contains  these  sen- 
tences :  "Miss  Sarah  Howley — when  she  was  between  eight 
and  nine  years  old,  was  carried  by  her  friends  to  hear  a 
sermon,  where  the  minister  preached  upon  Mat.  11,  31 — 
My  yoke  is  easy  and  my  burden  is  light.  In  the  applying 
of  which  Scripture,  this  child  was  highly  awakened,  and 
made  deeply  sensible  of  the  condition  of  her  soul."  In  the 
following  sentence  there  is  direct  testimony  to  show  what 
was  expected  of  children  at  the  age  of  eight :  "O  mother, 


children's  books  223 

said  she,  it  is  not  any  particular  sin  of  omission  or  commis- 
sion, that  sticks  so  close  to  my  conscience,  as  the  sin  of  my 
nature ;  without  the  blood  of  Christ,  that  will  damn  me." 

The  poems  of  Isaac  Watts  were  composed  in  this  tra- 
dition. 'Several  of  his  songs  persist  in  twentieth-century 
anthologies  of  children's  lyrics.  He  has  a  niche  in  the 
"Lives"  of  Johnson,  who  in  the  condescending  manner  he 
often  assumed  toward  schoolmasters  and  matters  pertain- 
ing to  children,  holds  that  Watts  is  "at  least  one  of  the  few 
poets  with  whom  youth  and  ignorance  may  be  safely 
pleased."  Taking  further  notice  of  the  divine's  preoccu- 
pation with  childhood,  Johnson  writes  that  Watts  "condes- 
cended to  lay  aside  the  scholar,  the  philosopher,  and  the  wit, 
to  write  little  poems  of  devotion,  and  systems  of  instruction, 
adapted  to  their  wants  and  capacities,  from  the  dawn  of 
reason  through  its  gradations  of  advance  in  the  morning  of 
life.  Every  man,  acquainted  with  the  common  principles 
of  human  action,  will  look  with  veneration  on  the  writer, 
who  is  at  one  time  combating  Locke,  and  at  another  making 
a  catechism  for  children  in  their  fourth  year.  A  voluntary 
descent  from  the  dignity  of  science  is  perhaps  the  hardest 
lesson  that  humility  can  teach."  He  credits  Watts  with 
having  overcome  the  blunt,  coarse,  and  inelegant  style  of 
the  dissenters  by  showing  them  that  "zeal  and  purity  might 
be  expressed  and  enforced  by  polished  diction."  It  was 
by  Johnson's  recommendation  that  the  poems  of  Watts  were 
included  in  the  collection  for  which  Johnson  wrote  his 
"Lives." 

Watts  was  indeed  an  innovator.  He  defied  Calvinistic 
tradition  in  many  ways,  but  always  successfully,  as  the 
vogue  of  his  books  in  the  eighteenth  century  indicates.  In 
composing  his  hymns  it  was  necessary  to  ignore  the  em- 
bargo Calvin  had  laid  on  everything  but  metrical  psalms 
and  canticles.     Although  hampered   also  by   the  dearth  of 


224  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

tunes,  his  hymns,  many  of  them  for  children,  took  the  dis- 
senting world  by  storm.  He  gave  "an  utterance,  till  then 
unheard  in  England,  to  the  spiritual  emotions,  and  made 
hymn  singing  a  fervid  devotional  force."  The  Divine 
Songs  for  Children  and  Moral  Songs  (1720),  which  ran 
through  one  hundred  editions  before  1750,  was,  according 
to  Canon  Leigh  Bennett,  the  first  child's  hymn  book  in  Eng- 
lish. ^  This  path-breaking  collection  is  made  up  of  thirty- 
six  songs,  the  book  being  directed  to  ''all  that  are  concerned 
in  the  education  of  children."  The  opening  sentence  of  his 
Preface  reminds  one  of  the  seriousness  of  Janeway.  "It  is 
an  awful  and  important  charge  that  is  committed  to  you." 
Then  follow  paragraphs  of  apology  for  the  use  of  verse. 
His  third  reason  is  to  the  point :  "This  will  be  a  constant 
furniture  for  the  minds  of  children,  that  they  may  have 
something  to  think  upon  when  alone,  and  sing  over  to  them- 
selves. This  may  sometimes  give  their  thoughts  a  divine 
turn,  and  raise  a  young  meditation.  Thus  they  will  not 
be  forced  to  seek  relief  for  an  emptiness  of  mind,  out  of  the 
loose  and  dangerous  sonnets  of  the  age." 

His  titles  indicate  the  kind  of  furniture  Watts  thought 
fit  for  little  minds.  Some  are  of  a  general  nature :  General 
Song  of  Praise  to  God,  Praise  for  Creation  and  Prozndence, 
Praise  for  the  Gospel,  Excellency  of  the  Bible.  These  are 
phrased  in  simple  diction  adapted  to  children.  Then  fol- 
low more  specific  subjects,  in  a  more  imaginative  strain. 
Praise  for  Mercies  Spiritual  and  Temporal,  for  instance. 

How  many  children   in   the   street 

Half  naked  I  behold! 
While  I  am  clothed  from  head  to  feet. 

And  covered  from  the  cold. 

1  But  compare  Bishop  Ken's  "Manual  of  Prayers  for  Win- 
chester Scholars"  (1674),  and  "Hymns  for  Morning,  Evening,  and 
Midnight"  (1695)- 


children's  dooks  225 

Patriotism  is  inculcated  in  Praise  for  Birth  and  Education 
in  a  Christian  Land: 

'Tis   to   thy   sovereign   grace   I    owe 
That  I  was  born  on   British  ground ; 
Where    streams    of    heavenly    mercy    flow, 
And    words    of    sweet    salvation    sound.  - 

I  would  not  change  my  native  land 
For  rich  Peru  with  all  her  gold ; 
A  nobler  prize  lies  in  my  hand, 
Than  East  or  Western   Indies  hold. 

Practical  application  of  moral  precepts  to  the  daily  life 
of  children  is  made  in  Against  Lying,  Love  Betu'ccn 
Brothers  and  Sisters,  Against  Scoffifig  and  Calling  Xaines, 
Taking  God's  Name  in  Vain,  Agaiiist  Idleness  and  Mischief, 
Evil  Company,  Pride  in  Clothes,  and  Obedience  to  Parents. 
Of  this  group,  Against  Quarreling  and  Eighting  has  per- 
sisted to  our  day. 

Let   bears   and   lions   growl   and    fight, 

For  God  hath  made  them  so ; 
Let  dogs  delight  to  bark  and  bite. 

For  'tis  their  nature  too. 

But,  children,  you  should  never  let 

Such  angry  passions  rise ; 
Your  little  hands  were  never  made 

To  tear  each  other's  eyes. 

Against  Idleness  and  Mischief,  which  is  also  familiar,  has 
survived  because  its  phrasing  as  well  as  its  moral  is  neat. 
The  language  and  imagery  are  conceived  in  the  admiring 
mood  of  childhood. 

-  Vain  of  our  beauteous  isle,  and  justly  vain. 

For  freedom  here,  and   Health,  and    Plenty   reign ; 
We  different  lots  contemptuously  compare. 
And  boast,  like  children,  of  a  favourite's  share. 

(Langhorne's  Enlargement  of  the  Mind.  I7^)3)- 


226  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

How  doth  the  little  busy  bee 

Improve  each  shining  hour, 
And  gather  honey  all  the  day 

From  every  opening  flower ! 

How  skilfully  she  builds  her  cell ! 

How  neat  she  spreads  the  wax ! 
And  labours  hard  to  store  it  well 

With  the  sweet  food  she  makes. 

Even  partial  quotation  serves  to  indicate  his  approach 
to  the  child  mind.  The  place  which  animals  held  in  the 
poetry  of  the  century  has  already  been  noticed.  Animals 
are  in  fact  the  first  active  interest  of  children.  Kipling 
in  the  Just  So  Stories  and  the  Ju)igle  Books  appealed  to  the 
same  keen  delight  of  children  in  animal  life  as  the  early 
Watts  in  the  illustrative  stanzas  of  his  songs.  Grimm's 
Fairy  Tales  teem  with  animals  that  are  often  humanized 
agents  in  the  action.  One  need  not  look  for  a  literary  aa- 
tecedent  in  Aesop's  Fables,  which  were  almost  universally 
read  by  children  at  this  time,  or  in  the  Bestiary,  Old  Testa- 
ment prophecy,  New  Testament  accounts  of  the  Christ 
child,  or  in  the  Saints  Legends  of  the  infancy  of  Christ. 
The  folk  lore  of  all  peoples  is  crowded  with  animals.  Watts 
was  sufficiently  attuned  to  the  child  mind  to  introduce 
naturally  the  phenomena  of  animal  life. 

Children  are  conceived  dramatically  as  speaking  in  a 
simple  didactic  way.  This  manner  is  easily  convincing  in 
stanzas  where  the  illustrative  matter  is  visualized.  Bibli- 
cal illustrations  are  also  introduced  in  a  homely  phrasing 
that  bears  witness  to  the  imaginative  vigor  and  simplicity  of 
the  poet's  style.  In  Love  Betzi/een  Brothers  and  Sisters  the 
first  stanza  suggests  a  picture  of  street  brawls,  and  brothers 
and  sisters  at  peace  in  the  home.  The  second  stanza  opens 
with  "Birds  in  their  little  nests  agree."  In  the  third  he 
speaks  of  clubs  and  naked  swords,  the  latter  not  poetic  li- 


children's  books  227 

cense,  as  swords  were  carried  at  that  time.  Watts  adheres 
to  his  purpose  of  sinking  the  language  to  the  level  of  a 
child's  understanding.  As  he  is  careful  to  avoid  artificial 
adornment,  so  he  usually  succeeds  in  bringing  forward  Bib- 
Itcal  instances  in  colloquial  and  idiomatic  phrasing: 

The    Devil    tempts    one    mother's    son 

To  rage  against  another; 
So  wicked  Cain  was  hurried  on 

Till    he    had    killed    his    brother. 

Watts  was  professedly  liberal  in  his  conception  of  a  body 
of  verse  for  children.  "So  that  you  will  find  here  nothing 
that  savours  of  a  party ;  the  children  of  high  and  low  de- 
gree, of  the  Church  of  England  or  Dissenters,  baptized  in 
infancy,  or  not,  may  all  join  together  in  these  Songs."  His 
songs  nevertheless  were  conditioned  by  the  sectarian  no- 
tions of  his  immediate  public.  It  conceived  of  all  poetry 
as  vain  and  dangerous,  and  preferred  the  flattest  transla- 
tions of  the  psalms,  sung  in  tunes  of  equal  dullness.  Watts 
himself  takes  note  of  the  narrower  view  of  life  while  medi- 
tating in  a  grove,  when  he  warns  oflf  vain  thoughts  by  say- 
ing that  no  Phyllis  shall  infect  the  air  with  her  unhallowed 
name.  The  sterner  elements  of  Janeway  come  to  the  sur- 
face in  such  songs  as  Solemn  Thoughts  of  God  and  Death, 
Heaven  and  Hell,  and  Danger  of  Delay.  In  Scoffing  and 
Calling  Names  the  grim  reality  of  the  anthropoinorphic  con- 
ception comes  out  when  the  child  is  made  to  exclaim 

Great  God,  how  terrible  art  thou 
To  sinners  e'er  so  young! 

The  limitations  of  the  pessimistic  traditions  that  he  in- 
herits lead  Watts,  as  in  Danger  of  Delay,  into  unrelieved 
glooms.  Children  for  whom  he  intended  his  songs  were 
not  permitted  to  live  in  a  delightful  period  which  is  made 


228  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

happy  through  the  absence  of  self-consciousness  and  ig- 
norance of  life.  The  child  is  led  to  ask  why  it  should 
say  that  it  is  yet  too  early  to  think  of  death,  for  a  flower 
may  fade  before  noon,  and  the  child  may  die  this  day. 

'Tis  dangerous  to  provoke  a  God ! 

His   power   and   vengeance    none    can    tell ; 

One  stroke  of  his  Almighty  rod 

Shall    send    young    sinners    quick    to    Hell. 

It  is  this  strain  in  Watts  that  has  led  writers  on  children 
to  class  him  as  of  the  revengeful  school.  Tradition  and 
environment  were  again  too  strong  for  him  in  the  beau- 
tiful Cradle  Hymn,  which  he  need  not  have  printed  apolo- 
getically at  the  end  of  his  collection  of  songs.  The  poem 
shows  the  conflict  between  the  gentle  love  of  the  man  Watts 
and  the  theology  of  the  sectarian  Watts.  The  lovely  open- 
ing stanza  with  its  delicate  conception  of  the  infant  and  the 
blessing  gently  falling  upon  it,  shades  into  less  appealing 
emotions  of  the  mother  who  becomes  incensed  over  the 
"cursed  sinners"  who  could  provide  nothing  but  a  manger 
for  their  lord.  It  makes  her  angry  to  read  the  shameful 
story  of  how  the  Lord  was  abused.  She  tells  her  infant 
that  he  has  been  saved  from  '*  burning  flame",  ''bitter 
groans",  and  ''endless  crying."  Alice  Morse  Earle  impa- 
tiently dismisses  the  poem :  "This  certainly  seems  an  ill- 
phrased  and  exciting  lullaby,  but  is  perhaps  what  might  be 
expected  is  the  notion  of  a  soothing  cradle  hymn  from  a  bi- 
goted old  bachelor."  Although  one  may  agree  with  the 
statement  in  the  particular  instance  which  called  it  forth,  it 
is  historically  somewhat  unfair  in  view  of  the  advanced  po- 
sition taken  by  Watts  in  the  composition  of  poems  for 
children.  Severely  limited  as  he  was  by  his  antecedents 
and  environment.  Watts  is  not  altogether  a  bigot  either  in 
his  life  or  in  his  songs  for  children.     To  be  sure,  his  ser- 


children's  nooKs  229 

nions  and  Horac  Lyricac  are  with  "rank  Geneva  weeds  run 
o'er,"  but  much  in  the  same  way  and  for  the  same  reasons 
that  the  work  of  the  neo-classical  poets  is  embelHshed  with 
cupids  and  Greek  and  Roman  g^oddesses.  Sprat  was  horri- 
fied that  Milton  should  have  been  named  in  a  Latin  epitaph 
on  the  tomb  of  J.  Philipps  in  Westminster  Abbey,  and  or- 
dered the  offensive  line  obliterated.  Although  there  was 
much  bitter  wrangling  between  Puritans  and  the  Establish- 
ment, Watts  showed  his  liberal  spirit  in  that  he  would  not 
impose  a  belief  in  the  Trinity  on  independent  ministers,  and 
in  that  he  was  willing  to  surrender  the  doctrine  of  infant 
baptism  if  the  Baptists  would  forego  immersion.  In  the 
dismal  Young  Men  and  Maidens,  Old  Men  and  Babes  a 
parenthetical  aside  illuminates  the  man  on  the  liberal  side, 
which  could  not  be  wholly  suppressed.  And  as  for  the  ac- 
cusation that  he  was  a  bachelor,  a  study  of  eighteenth- 
century  poetry  will  reveal  that  a  large  part  of  the  poetry  of 
the  century  was  in  the  hands  of  bachelor  poets. 

In  the  encyclopedic  nature  of  his  mind  Watts  was  a  true 
son  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Every  possible  phase  of  his 
parishioners'  education,  even  to  the  minutiae  of  their  amuse- 
ments, was  noticed  by  him.  His  range  lies  from  an  essay 
on  the  art  of  reading  and  writing  English  with  a  variety 
of  instructions  for  true  spelling,  to  an  attempt  at  a  Brief 
System  of  Ontology.  He  wrote  on  "A  Preservation  from 
the  sins  and  follies  of  Childhood  and  Youth,  or  a  brief  ac- 
count of  the  sins,  vices,  and  frailties  to  which  Childhood 
and  youth  are  liable,"  etc.  He  composed  prayers  for  the 
use  of  children.  They  are  graded  carefully  from  child- 
hood to  youth.  In  verse  and  prose  he  provided  for  his 
parishioners  a  visualization  of  their  aspirations,  desires,  ex- 
periences, and  theological  convictions,  from  the  cradle  to 
the  time  of  their  appearance  before  the  throne  of  the  Al- 


230  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

mighty.  We  come  upon  cradle  songs,  elegies,  sick-bed 
prayers,  didactic  pieces,  and  hymns  of  praise.  In  all  of 
these  there  are  unmistakable  signs  of  a  true  appreciation  of 
childhood  and  a  recognition  of  the  interests  of  children. 
Considered  from  the  purely  secular  point  of  view,  warped 
as  the  man  is  by  professional  and  theological  preoccupa- 
tions, and  conditioned  and  limited  as  he  is  by  tradition, 
so  that  we  find  children  innocently  playing  the  tempter's 
part,  fearing  eternal  doom,  or  drawing  the  heart  of  man 
from  a  Calvinistic  conception  of  God,  yet  amid  the  gloom 
of  the  Monrmng-Piecc  they  are 

Children,  those  dear  young  limbs,  those  tenderest  pieces, 
Of  your  own  flesh,  those  little  other  selves, 
How  they  dilate  the  heart  to  wide  dimensions. 

Such  phrasings,  imbedded  as  they  often  are  in  brim- 
stone lines  that  Mrs.  Trimmer  eliminated  when  she  com- 
piled his  songs  at  the  close  of  the  century,  make  Watts  an 
exceptional  figure  during  the  first  half  of  the  century.  His 
own  limitations  were  clear  to  him:  ''May  some  happier 
genius  promote  the  same  service  that  I  proposed,  and  by 
superior  sense,  and  sweeter  sound,  render  what  I  have  writ- 
ten, contemptible  and  useless."  What  is  no  longer  con- 
genial has  been  superseded.  Four  of  the  thirty-six  songs 
for  children  are  still  widely  read  in  contemporary  antho- 
logies of  children's  verse,  and  others  are  occasionally  quoted. 

In  addition  to  extensive  catechetical  exercises  in  the 
schools,  children  were  subjected  to  cross-examination  at 
home.  Such  a  secular  publication  as  Defoe's  Family  In- 
structor, which  achieved  a  nineteenth  edition  in  1809,  re- 
flects the  pitiless  self-analysis  indicated  in  the  songs  of 
Watts.  The  dialogue  in  which  Defoe  carries  on  his  in- 
struction is  divided  into  three  parts :  i )  Father  and  Child ; 
2)   Mother  and  Child;  3)   Husband  and  Wife.     It  was  De- 


CHILDREN  S    ROOKS  231 

foe's  belief  that  the  questions  asked  are  "proper  even  to  a 
child  .  .  .  the  author  has  k.MideavaVed  to  produce  the 
question  with  an  air  of  mere  nature,  innocence,  and  child- 
hood .  .  .  and  the  child's  understanding  may  justly  be 
supposed  to  have  proposed  them  .  .  .  our  child  asks  but 
very  little  of  his  father,  but  what  a  child  of  that  aj^^e  may  be 
very  capable  of  asking."  While  catechising  the  child,  De- 
foe has  his  eye  on  the  sins  of  the  father  also,  for  at  one 
point  in  the  dialogue  we  find  an  aside  to  the  effect  that  here 
the  child  cries,  and  the  father  blushes,  or  at  least  he  ought  to 
have  done  so.  Upon  the  mention  of  eternal  hell  fire,  con- 
viction works  in  the  child,  and  it  weeps.  There  is  the 
pitifully  natural  plea  of  the  child,  "I  be'nt  big  enough  yet." 
A  typical  question  put  into  the  mouth  of  the  child  is : 
"What  will  become  of  me  then,  father,  if  I  was  wicked  when 
I  was  born?"  That  the  language  is  not  altogether  level 
with  the  child's  comprehension  is  clear  from  the  father's 
definition  of  faith :  "And  faith,  child,  is  a  fiducial,  filial  con- 
fidence." Defoe's  prose  has  all  the  gloom,  but  none  of  the 
simplicity  and  occasional  charm  of  Watts's  poetry  for  chil- 
dren. 

The  inherent  interest  of  mankind  in  supernatural  life, 
and  the  romantic  attraction  of  things  outside  and  beyond 
the  experiences  of  mortal  life,  were  not  satisfied  in  other 
than  dissenting  circles  by  theological  explanations  of  a 
personal  devil  who  interfered  in  the  life  of  nian.  The  ter- 
rible realities  of  the  concrete  Calvinistic  conceptions,  and 
their  immediate  application  to  the  commonest  activities  of 
children,  precluded  an  appeal  to  the  imaginative  play  in- 
terest of  children.  In  fact,  one  of  the  chief  incentives  of 
Watts  was  the  hope  that  his  poems  would  serve  as  a  sub- 
stitute for  secular  works  that  fell  into  the  hands  of  Dis- 


232  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

senting  children.  Among  men  of  letters  of  a  different  cast, 
the  kind  of  play  interest  that  children  find  in  goblins  and 
fairies  was  condemned  as  out  of  harmony  with  the  dictates 
of  reason.  In  the  estimation  of  Buckingham,  the  light  of 
plain  reason,  which  was  spread  by  Hobbes,  banished  such 
fantastic  forms  as  ghosts ;  after  Hobbes,  men  no  longer  "in 
dark  ignorance  lay."  And  what  the  classicist  poets  thought 
of  ''Gothic  night"  as  applied  to  all  ages  but  their  own  is 
well  known.  Although  it  would  seem  that  between  the 
dissenters  on  the  one  hand  and  the  followers  of  the  en- 
lightenment on  the  other,  the  opportunities  for  a  child's 
imaginative  escape  were  slim,  nevertheless  poets  bear  wit- 
ness down  through  the  century  to  the  presence  of  fairies, 
outlaws,  witches,  and  other  wonders  that  appeal  to  child- 
hood in  all  ages.  While  the  fashionable  literature  of  the 
metropolis  was  flourishing  in  the  reign  of  Anne  and  the 
first  George,  a  love  of  Spenser  and  Shakespeare  and  Milton 
was  growing.  The  popular  ballads  were  noticed  even  by 
Addison  in  the  famous  comment  on  Chevy  Chase.  While 
this  literary  leaven  was  at  work  in  high  places,  the  humble 
ballads  hawked  by  chapmen,  and  the  chap  books  themselves, 
kept  alive  ancient  folk  traditions  of  fairies,  witches,  and 
ghosts. 

At  the  cottage  fireside  and  at  the  nurse's  knee,  highborn 
and  cottage  children  alike  kept  continuously  in  touch  with 
the  marvelous  and  supernatural.  Age-old  tales,  "To  cheat 
our  children  with  to  rest,"  persisted  during  the  days  before 
the  brothers  Grimm  collected  them  in  book  form.  Even 
the  moral  Cotton  hoped  that  his  didactic  pieces  would  have 
the  pulling  power  of  fairy  tales :  "like  fairy  tales  to  please 
the  child."  John  Gilbert  Cooper  saw  fairies  and  elves 
capering  about  the  banks  of  Trent.  Young's  Epistle  to  Lord 
Landsdoume  exalts  Shakespeare  at  the  expense  of  Corneille. 


children's  books  233 

Young  thinks  of  the  self-conscious  artistry  of  Corneille  after 
every  scene,  but  of  Shakesi)eare  only  after  the  fall  of  the 
curtain,  so  great  is  his  verisimilitude: 

His   witches,    fairies,   and   enchanted   isle, 
Bid  us  no  longer  at  our  nurses  smile. 

Johnson  says  that  Collins  "loved  fairies,  genii,  giants,  and 
monsters ;  he  delighted  to  rove  through  the  meanders  of 
enchantment."  William  Erskine's  continuation  of  the  Ode 
on  the  Popular  Superstitions  of  the  Hi^^hlands  of  Scotland 
weaves  in  the  popular  superstition  of  changelings. 

Soft  o'er  the  floor  the  treacherous  fairies  creep, 

And  bear  the  smiling  infant  far  away ; 

How  starts  the  nurse,  when,  for  her  lovely  child 

She  sees  at  dawn  a  gaping  idiot  stare. 

O  snatch  the  innocent  from  the  demons  wild. 

And  save  the  parents  fond  from  fell  despair. 

Mackenzie  may  write  of  Gothic  jargon,  but  in  The  Old  Maid 
he  notices  goblins,  and  his  Old  Maid  depends  on  her  fairy 
tales,  which  compete  with  fables,  to  attract  children. 

Tho'  ne'er  from  her  embrace  had  children  sprung. 

Yet  alien   imps   with   kindness  would   she   greet. 
And  oft  with  pleasure  heard  the  lisping  tongue. 

And  gave  the  promised  meed  of  candied  sweet ; 
And  oft  the  tale  of  wonderment  she  told. 

Of  Fayes.  that  gambled  o'er  the  circly  ground. 
And  birds,  that  taught  the  moral  lore  of  old. 

Then  strewed  the  snowy  comfits  all  around ; 
Thilk  would  she  see  them  glean  with  looks  of  grace. 

And  stroked  the  flaxen  pole,  and  blessed  the  smiling  face ! 

James  Grahame  in  Sabbath  Walks  notes  how 

Children    would    run    to   meet   him   on    his    way. 
And  lead  him  to  a  sunny  seat,  and  climb 
His  knee,  and  wonder  at  his  oft-told  tales. 

(An   Autumn   Sabbath    I  Talk) 


234  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Gray's  Long  Story  gives  an  insight  into  the  lively  supersti- 
tions of  country  folk  who  suspect  "a  wicked  imp,  they  call 
a  poet," 

Who  prowled  the  country  far  and  near, 

Bewitched  the  children  of  the  peasants, 
Dried  up  the  cows,  and  lamed  the  deer, 

And  sucked  the  eggs,  and  killed  the  pheasants.  ^ 

Even  Shenstone,  whose  countryside  is  most  often  peopled 
with  nymphs  and  fauns  ''or  naiad  leaning  o'er  her  tinkling 
urn,"  had  attempted  the  story  of  St.  Kenelm,  the  boy  martyr. 
But  the  habit  of  the  age  is  too  strong  for  him,  and  he  soon 
loses  die  romantic  story  in  long  stanzas  of  moralizing." 

Like  Thomas  Warton,  the  poets  very  frequently  found 
the  "ways  of  hoar  antiquity"  not  rough  and  barren,  **but 
strewn  with  flowers" ;  and  publishers'  announcements  in- 
dicate a  persistent  interest  in  fairy  tales.  The  fairy  element 
creeps  into  the  lines  of  Tickell,  Swift,  Lyttleton,  Akenside, 
and  Parnell ;  and  Gay's  portrayal  of  the  quack  doctor  and 
his  mountebanks  emphasizes  the  wide  appeal  of  ballads  like 
Children  in  the  Wood.  Although  Johnson  ridiculed  bal- 
lads in  his  Burlesque  on  the  "tender  infant"  that  fell  on  a 
stone  and  became  a  ''squealing  child,"  they  persisted  among 
the  common  people  and  grew  in  popularity  with  cultivated 
readers.  Joseph  Mather,  a  Yorkshire  poet,  has  memorial- 
ized a  ballad  monger  who  sang  in  taverns  to  advertise  his 
wares,  and  Wordsworth  in  The  Prelude  (V,  211)  writes  of 

1  See  Blake's  illustration  for  this  passage  in  William  Blake's 
Designs  for  Gray's  Poems  (reproduced  full-size  in  monochrome  or 
colour  from  the  unique  copy  belonging  to  His  Grace  the  Duke  of 
Hamilton).— Oy^ior 6.  University  Press,  1922. 

-  Delight   in   fairies   is   expressed   in   Mary  Lamb's    The  Fairy: 
If  I  had  such  dreams,  I  would  sleep  a  whole  year : 
I  would  not  wish  to  wake  while  a  fairy  was  near. 


CHILDRKX'S    BOOKS  235 

ballad  tunes. 
Food   for  the   hungry  ears  of  little   ones.  ^ 

No  doubt  many  children  were  in  the  audience  at  the  moun- 
tebank show  of  Gay's  quack  doctor,  and  were  deeply  moved 
by  the  sinp^ino^  of  Children  in  the  Wood.  Gay,  who  was  a 
native  of  Devonshire,  is  sufficiently  partial  to  homely  ma- 
terial to  enlarge  on  the  sentimental  effect  of  this  ballad. 
While  the  doctor  was  selling-  his  balsams  and  pills.  Jack 
Pudding  in  his  "party-colored  jacket"  entertained  the 
country  folk  with  songs  about  raree-shows  and  the  feats  of 
Punch. 

Then   sad   he   sung  the   Children  in  the   Wood ; 
Ah !  barbarous  uncle,  stained  with  infant  blood ! 
How  blackberries  they  plucked  in  deserts  wild, 
And  fearless  at  the  glittering  falcon  smiled : 
The  little  corpse  the  robin-red-breasts  found, 
And  strowed  with  pious  bill  the  leaves  around. 
Ah  !  gentle  birds !  if  this  verse  last  so  long, 
Your  names  shall  live  for  ever  in  my  song. 

(The    Shepherd's    Week,    Saturday) 

The  last  line  indicates  that  the  poet  of  refinement  thought 
he  was  doing  the  lowly  ballad  a  service  by  memorializing 
it  to  posterity.  He  could  not  know  the  high  esteem  in  which 
ballads  were  to  be  held  in  less  than  a  half  century.  The 
passage,  coming  as  it  does  in  17 14,  is  remarkable  for  its 
summary  of  the  simple  story,  and  for  the  poet's  frankly  ex- 
pressed sympathy.  He  employs  the  ballad  as  more  than  a 
mere  literary  device  to  be  passed  over  in  a  colorless  refer- 
ence. The  ballad  is  recognized  as  an  emotional  force  in  the 
program  of  the  mountebank,  and  the  poet  is  himself  car- 

^  Swift's  Baueis  and  Phihniioti  tells  of 

The  ballads  pasted  on  the  wall, 
Of  Joan  of  France  and  English  Moll, 
Fair  Rosamond   and   Robin   Hood, 
The  Little  Children  in  the  Wood. 


236  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

ried  into  sympathy  by  the  details.  With  Lilly-bullero,  the 
Irish  Trot,  the  Bower  of  Rosamond,  and  Robin  Hood, 
Chevy  Chase  is  also  sung  with  its  woeful  tale  of 

Wars  to  be   wept  by  children  yet  unborn. 

For  the  purposes  of  our  study,  Gay's  Shepherd's  Week  is 
noteworthy  for  its  emphasis  on  folk  lore.  When  child- 
hood emerges  in  poetry,  there  emerge  with  it  the  nurse, 
fairy  tales,  the  schoolmistress  and  schoolmaster,  and  other 
accessories.  Gay's  An  Apparition,  with  its  ''nurse-invented 
lies,"  is  likewise  of  interest  as  showing  the  persistence  of 
humble  matter.  In  it  we  are  told  some  of  the  stories 
which  "descend  from  son  to  son."  Gay  can  not,  of  course, 
any  more  than  Shenstone  later,  escape  from  the  moral  im- 
plications and  didactic  possibilities  of  such  stories.  He  must 
moralize  the  efficacy  of  Children  in  the  Wood  in  bringing 
offenders  to  account.  In  his  opinion  such  ballads  have 
been  known  to  arouse  the  "fraudful  guardian's  fright"  to 
the  extent  of  compelling  him  to  restore  illgot  gains.  In  an 
age  that  at  any  rate  pretended  to  shun  anything  but  known 
truths,  it  was  necessary  to  make  the  supernatural  palatable 
by  calling  attention  to  its  practical  value  in  the  given  in- 
stance. 

Children  in  the  Wood  was  one  of  the  most  popular  bal- 
lads of  the  century ;  poets  referred  to  it  constantly ;  and  the 
chap  books  gave  both  verse  and  prose  forms  (The  Most 
Lamentable  and  Deplorable  History  of  the  Tzuo  Children 
in  the  Wood),  with  at  least  one  instance  of  a  variant  ob- 
viously based  on  the  ballad :  The  Distressed  Child  in  the 
Wood;   or  the   Cruel   Unkle.  ^     Wordsworth   notices   Chil- 

1  The  traditional  fairy  tale  motive  of  the  cruel   stepmother  is 
noticed  in  J.  Merrick's  Ode  to  Fancy: 

And  babes,   who  owe   their  shortened   date 
To  cruel  step-dame's  ruthless  hate. 


children's    150()KS  2'S7 

drcn  in  the  Wood  in  The  Excursion,  ^  but  more  winnin^ly 
in  Redbreast  Chasing  the  Butterfly,  where  he  is  shocked  at 
the  predatory  habits  of  the  bird 

That,  after  their  bewildering. 
Covered  with  leaves  the  little  children. 
So  painfully   in   the   wood. 

It  was  his  favorite  ballad,  and  was  noticed  by  him  in  De- 
scriptive Sketches:  he  also  quoted  a  stanza  in  the  prefatory 
remarks  to  Lucy  Gray. 

At  the  cottage  fireside  in  Beattie's  The  Minstrel  (1770- 
1777),  when  the  driving  snow  had  shut  the  cottagers  in,  the 
beldam  ("instructed  by  tradition  hoar")  told  stories  and 
sang  ballads  while  the  nut-brown  ale  went  the  rounds.  She 
told  of  moonlight  revels  of  the  fairies, 

Or  hags,   that  suckle  an   infernal   brood, 
And  ply  in  caves  the  unutterable  trade. 
Midst  fiends  and  spectres,  quench  the  Moon  in  blood. 
Yell  in  the  midnight  storm,  or  ride  the  infuriate  flood. 

When  horror  had  been  raised  to  the  highest  pitch  in  the 
staring  and  trembling  rustics  about  the  fire,  the  ballad  of 
the  nut-brown  maid  was  sung  to  relieve  tension.  Then  she 
told  in  a  gentler  strain 

A  tale  of  rural  life,  a  tale  of  woes. 

The   orphan  babes  and   guardian   uncle   fierce. 

This  simple  story,  above  all  others,  seems  to  have  been  told 

con  amore : 

To  latest  times  shall  tender  souls  bemoan 
Those  helpless  orphan  babes  by  thy  fell  arts  undone. 

Like  Gay,  Beattie  can  not  refrain  from  indicating  the 
outlines  of  the  story,  but  he  docs  so  with  greater  realization 
of  the  child  element : 

1  Book  VII,  90. 


238  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Behold,  with  berries  smeared,  with  brambles  torn, 
The  babes  now  famished  lay  them  down  to  die : 
Amidst  the  howl  of  darksome  woods  forlorn, 
Folded  in  one  another's  arms  they  lie ; 
Nor  friend  nor  stranger  hears  their  dying  cry. 

This  tale  was  intended  especially  for  the  child  Edwin,  whose 
sense  of  justice  it  was  meant  to  stir: 

A  stifled  smile  of  stern  vindictive  joy 
Brightened   one  moment   Edwin's   starting  tear : 
"But  why  should  gold  man's  feeble  mind  decoy, 
And  innocence  thus  die  by  doom  severe?" 
O  Edwin!  while  thy  heart  is  yet  sincere. 
The  assaults  of  discontent  and  doubt  repel  .    .    . 
Nor  be  thy  generous   indignation  checked, 
Nor  checked   the   tender   tear   to    Misery   given. 

White's  Childhood  tells  how  the  poet  and  other  children 
begged  of  the  maid  the  story  of  the  wicked  guardian,  and 
of  how  they  were  moved  : 

At  each  pause  we  wrung  our  hands  and  wept 

Sad  was  such  tale,  and  wonder  much  did  we 

Such  hearts  of  stone  there  in  the  world  could  be. 

Charles  Lamb,  who  loved  sentiment  where  he  found  it, 
made  use  of  the  ballad  in  his  lines  to  the  incomparable  Sid- 
dons.  ^ 

Anon  the  tear 
More  gentle  starts,  to  hear  the  Beldame  tell 
Of  pretty  babes,  that  loved  each  other  dear, 
Murdered  by  cruel  Uncle's  mandate  fell. 

Only  one  other  ballad  vies  with  this  in  popularity,  and 
that  is  Chevy  Chase,  A  favorite  phrase  is  "child  unborn," 
as  in  Mason's  //  Bellicoso: 

How  the  child,  that's  yet  unborn. 
May  rue  Earl  Percy's  hound  and  horn. 


cniLDki:\'s  books  239 

Wordsworth,  in  lines  which  do  not  appear  in  the  Tlianks- 
gk'ing  Ode  (1816)  as  now  printed,  recalls  how  he  imbibed 
patriotic  sentiments  from  ballads  suni^  to  him  in  childhood  : 

Land  of  our  fathers!  loved  by  me 
Since  the  first  joys  of  thinking  infancy; 
Loved  with  a  passion  since  I  caught  thy  praise 
A  Listener,  at  or  on  some  patient  knee. 
With  an  ear  fastened  to  rude  ballad  lays. 

It  was  in  fact  at  some  nurse's  or  mother's  knee,  or  with 
the  father  at  the  evening  fireside,  that  children  heard  wonder 
stories  and  ballads.  Thomson's  Winter  describes  a  cot- 
tage background  that  makes  clear  how  at  the  very  time 
when  classical  restraint  in  poetry  was  at  the  height  of  fa- 
shion in  the  metropolis,  Gay  as  a  country  lad  could  have 
reveled  in  an  atmosphere  of  romantic  wonder. 

Meantime  the  village  rouses  up  the  fire; 
While  well  attested,  and  as  well  believed. 
Heard  solemn,  goes  the  goblin  story  round. 
Till   superstitious  horror  creeps  o'er  all.      (617-620) 

What  Collins  writes  of  the  highlands  is  true  also  of  Eng- 
land : 

E'en  yet  preserved,  how  often  may'st  thou  hear. 

Where  to  the  pole  the  Boreal  mountains  run. 

Taught  by  the  father,  to  his  listening  son. 
Strange  lays,  whose  power  had  charmed  a  Spenser's  ear. 

Tickell's  Prospect  of  Peace  anticipates  the  romantic  fire- 
side motive  by  incidental  homely  touches  in  the  lines  which 
portray  the  returned  soldier  who  vividly  recalls  his  war 
experiences.  As  Tickell  is  writing  in  the  detached  man- 
ner of  the  classicists,  the  scene  is  generalized.  He  is  not, 
like  the  romanticists,  attracted  to  the  fireside  material  be- 
cause of  the  twilight  mood  with  which  it  is  readily  merged. 
Neither  is  he  interested  like  the  romanticists  in  the  humani- 
tarian  aspects   of  his   material.     The   fond   wife   hugs   her 


240  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

"rough  lord"  and  hangs  on  his  words  while  he  relates 
stories  of  battlefields.  His  children  smile  and  tremble  in 
turn  as  he  marks  feigned  trenches  in  the  spilled  wine,  sets 
the  ''inverted  fort"  before  them,  and  indicates  how  mines 
whirled  whole  battalions  to  the  skies. 

The  little  listening  progeny  turn  pale. 
And  beg  again  to  hear  the  dreadful  tale. 

This  is  a  mere  glimpse,  but  underlying  the  couplet  is  a  bit 
of  true  observation  that,  in  the  desire  of  the  children  for  a 
repetition  of  the  exciting  story,  is  in  harmony  with  the 
spirit  of  childhood. 

In  A  Night  Piece,  Mickle's  winter  evening  musings  car- 
ry him  to  thoughts  of  grandsires  who  by  winter  firesides  are 
relating  their  youthful  adventures  with  Marlborough's 
armies.  These  events  are  remote  enough  to  be  narrated 
in  the  same  mood  as  a  "monkish  tale."  In  this  connection 
the  poet  thinks  of  recent  events  that  took  place  during  the 
Seven  Years'  War  on  the  continent.  These  too  will  soon 
be  traditional  matter  for  a  fireside  story  to  be  told  to 
children. 

And  soon  the  days  shall  come, 
When  Prussia's  hinds  shall  wild  adventures  tell 
Of  Fred'ric  and  his  brothers,  such  as  oft 
The   British   labourer,   by  winter's   fire, 
Tells  to  his  wondering  children,  of  the  feats 
Of  Arthur  and  his  knights,  and  Celtic  wars. 

In  Vicissitude  the  cottager  is  again  telling  stories  before 
his  winter  fire.  While  the  tempests  blow  without,  he 
cheers  the  circle  with  heroic  tales  and  knightly  loves  of 
former  days. 

The  long-contented  evening  sweet  he  cheers ; 
While  from  his  day-sport  on  the  ice-bound  stream, 
Weary  returned,  with  wonder  and  delight, 
Unrazored  youth  the  various   legend  hears. 


CHILPREX'S    r.OOKS  241 

Thomas  Penrose  in  the  Elegy  (leaving  the  River  of 
Plate)  on  members  of  the  crew  lost  in  the  burning  of  a 
warship,  heightens  the  pathos  of  his  Hnes  by  alluding  to 
the  story  hour : 

In    vain    their    infants'    lisping    tongues    inquire. 
And  wait  the  story  on  their  father's  knee. 

In  Lochleven  (1766),  Bruce,  who  Hke  Thomson  looks 
upon  the  cottage  hearth  as  the  symbol  of  peaceful  con- 
tentment and  innocence,  links  childhood  with  the  story 
group.  Gaping  swains  and  children  sit  cozily  before  the 
blazing  hearth  while  an  aged  peasant  relates  stories  of 
other  times.  Bruce  shows  a  tendency  to  individualize  this 
village  chronicler  by  writing  of  him  in  the  first  person  in  a 
mood  of  personal  recollection,  but  the  children  are  still 
generalized  as  "circling  round  the  fire."  ^ 

Mackenzie's  Pursuits  of  Happiness  recognizes  the  close 
ties  established  between  age  and  childhood  during  the 
story-hour, 

Where  truth  sat  brooding,  like  a  white-plumed  dove. 
O'er  infant  friendship,  and  o'er  infant  love; 
The  fairy  tale  by  simple  nurses  told. 
And  memory  rushing  in  the  songs  of  old. 

Individualization  is  more  closely  approached  in  The  In- 
ventory (1786),  in  which  Burns  gives  intimate  glimpses  of 
the  cottage  household  in  which  there  are  three  mischievous 
boys. 

Run  deils  for  ranting  an'   for  noise. 

One  is  a  driver  of  a  team,  another  a  thresher's  assistant, 
while 

Wee  Davock  bauds  the  nowt  in  fother. 

^   In  Goldsmith's  The  Traveller,  the  pilgrim  "With  many  a  tale 
repays  the  nightly  bed." 


242  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Their  father  reports  that  he  rules  them  with  discretion,  al- 
though he  must  often  ''labor  them  completely."  Every 
night,  and  especially  on  Sunday,  he  examines  them  shrewdly 
on  the  ''questions."  The  poet's  unconventional  description 
of  Davock's  recitation  of  his  lessons  from  memory  is  con- 
ceived with  convincing  detail.  The  little  fellow  is  not  a 
lay  figure,  but  a  real  child.  His  father  has  been  persistent 
in  his  nightly  quizzing, 

Till,  faith!  wee  Davock's  grown  sae  gleg, 
Tho'  scarcely  langer  than  your  leg. 
He'll  screed  you  off  "Effectual  Calling", 
As  fast  as  ony  in  the  dwalling. 

The  cottager's  "sonsie,  smirking,  dear-bought  Bess"  is  less 
fully  individualized  by  the  father's  remark  that  the  features 
of  the  "bonie,  sweet  wee  lady"  resemble  his : 

She  stares  the  daddy  in  her  face. 

In  Wilford  Churchyard,  White  expresses  a  preference 
for  burial  in  village  ground,  where,  unlike  in  city  burial 
places,  the  dead  are  respected  by  shepherds  and  cottagers. 

I've  seen 
The  labourer,  returning  from  his  toil. 
Here  stay  his  steps,  and  call  his  children  round. 
And  slowly  spell  the   rudely  sculptured  rhymes, 
And,  in  his  rustic  manner,  moralise. 

White's  thoughts  turn  in  Clifton  Grove  to  the  fireside  of 
those  who  are  more  fortunate  than  he.  As  twilight  deepens 
into  night  he  can  no  longer  hear  the  strokes  of  the  wood- 
man who  had  been  busy  in  the  dingle  since  early  morning. 
In  the  inevitable  contrast  between  wicked  city  night  pleas- 
ures and  natural  pastoral  relaxation,  he  prefers  the  simple 
joys  of  the  laborer  who  now 


children's  books  243 

wears   the   social   smile, 
Released  from  day  and  its  attendant  toil, 
And  draws  his  household  round  their  evening  fire. 
And  tells  the  oft-told  tales  that  never  tire. 

Such  ancient  tales  did  not  depend  solely,  however,  on 
oral  transmission ;  they  were  retailed  for  common  people 
in  chap  books,  to  which  children  must  have  had  access  di- 
rectly, or  indirectly,  through  the  story-hour  which  would 
adapt  to  their  comprehension  what  the  parent  had  himself 
enjoyed  in  the  chap  books.  ^  These  diminutive  paper-cov- 
ered publications  of  twenty-four  pages  no  doubt  existed  be- 
fore 1700,  but  were  at  the  height  of  their  popularity  during 
and  after  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne.  They  flourished  until 
1800,  but  declined  after  that  date  with  the  advent  of  penny 
magazines  and  Chambers's  tracts  and  miscellanies.  Most 
of  them  emanated,  in  the  earlier  years  of  the  century,  from 
the  press  of  the  Diceys  in  Aldemary  Churchyard.  They 
were  hawked  about  the  country-side  by  itinerant  pedlars 
known  as  chapmen,  who  carried  the  booklets  in  a  bag  with 
their  needles  and  notions.     Chatterton's  Tervono,  in  Fm^- 

1  Cawthorn's  The  Birth  and  Education  of  Genius  implies  oral 
tradition  as  well  as  book  material   (probably  chap  books)  : 
Time  now  had  rolled,  with  smooth  career, 
Our  hero  through  his  seventh  year. 
Though  in  a   rustic  cottage  bred, 
The  busy  imp  had  thought  and  read  : 
He  knew  the  adventures,  one  by  one. 
Of  Robin  Hood  and  Little  John ; 
Cou'd  sing  with  spirit,  warmth,  and  grace. 
The  woful  hunt  of  Chevy  Chace ; 
And  how  St.  George,  his  fiery  nag  on. 
Destroyed  the  vast  Egyptian  dragon. 
Chief  he  admired  that  learned  piece, 
Wrote  by  the  fabulist  of  Greece, 
Where  Wisdom  speaks  in  crows  and  cocks, 
And  Cunning  sneaks  into  a  fox. 


244  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

ment,  at  the  age  of  six  bartered  with  "the  ragged  chapman" 
and  won  from  him  **every  favourite  taw."  Children  in  the 
Lake  District  of  Cumberland  no  doubt  looked  forward  to 
the  seasonal  visit  of  the  hawker.  Wordsworth  wrote  in  the 
eighth  book  of  The  Prelude: 

From  far,  with  basket,  slung  upon  her  arm, 

Of  hawker's  wares — ^books,  pictures,  combs,  and  pins — 

Some  aged  woman  finds  her  way  again. 

Year  after  year  a  punctual  visitant !  ^ 

Among  the  chap  books  were  stories  of  edification, 
though  these  were  in  the  minority.  Such  is  A  Timely  IVarn- 
ning  to  rash  and  disobedient  Children,  Being  a  strange  and 
zvonderfnl  relation  of  a  young  gentleman  in  the  Parish  of 
Stepheny  in  the  subnrhs  of  London,  that  sold  himself  to  the 
Devil  for  twelve  years  to  have  power  of  being  revenged  on 
his  father  and  jnother,  and  hozv  his  time  being  expired  he 
lay  in  a  sad  and  deplorable  condition  to  the  amazement  of 
all  spectators.  .  .  .  Although  chap  books  are  not  as  a 
rule  dated,  this  one  bears  the  date  1721.  Chap  books  belong 
to  prose  literature,  but  often  they  break  into  verse,  and 
upon  occasion  are  wholly  in  verse,  as,  for  instance,  The 
Children's  Example,  showing  ''How  one  Mrs.  Johnson's 
Child  of  Barnet  was  tempted  by  the  Devil  to  forsake  God 
.  .  .  swear,  tell  lies,  and  disobey  her  parents  ...  re- 
sisted Satan  .  .  .  with  her  dying  speeches  desiring  young 
children  not  to  forsake  God,  lest  Satan  should  gain  power 
over  them."     Ashton  condemns  this  type  as  rubbish : 

^  Wordsworth  hoped  that  he  might  be  able  to  "produce  songs, 
poems,  and  little  histories  that  might  circulate  among  other  good 
things  in  this  way.  .  .  .  Indeed,  some  of  the  poems  which  I  have 
published  were  composed,  not  without  a  hope  that  at  some  time 
or  other  they  might  answer  this  purpose."  (1808) — Quoted  in  Lie- 
nemann,  op.  cit.,  p.  162. 


■mk 


ciiii.drkn's  nooKs  245 

As  this  child  went  to  school  one  day 
Through  the  churchyard  she  took  her  way. 
When  lo !  the  Devil  came  and  said. 
Where  arc  you  going,  pretty  Maid  ? 

After  some  hesitation  she  answered, 

To  school  I  am  going.  Sir   (said  she). 

After  further  hesitation,  whicli  under  the  circumstances  was 
natural  enough,  she  says, 

"In  name  of  Jesus  I  command !" 

At  which  the  Devil  instantly 

In    flames   of   Fire   away   did    fly. 

The  edification  of  these  stories  was  probably  willingly  en- 
dured for  such  melodramatic  entrances  and  exits. 

Although  such  books  were  bought  for  children,  they 
were  probably  less  interesting  to  them  than  the  more  fasci- 
nating tales  of  wonder  and  adventure  mentioned  in  the 
earliest  notices  of  chap  books.  In  1708  the  "Weekly 
Comedy"  (Jan.  22)  enumerates  Jack  and  the  Giants,  The 
King  and  the  Cobbler,  and  Tom  Thumb.  '  In  the  Tatler, 
Steele  speaks  through  Bickerstafif,  who  says  of  his  godson, 
aged  eight:  "I  find  he  has  very  much  turned  his  studies,  for 
about  twelve  months  past,  into  the  lives  and  adventures  of 
Don  Bellianis  of  Greece,  Guy  of  Warwick,  The  Seven 
Champions,  and  other  histories  of  the  age. — He  would 
tell  you  the  mismanagements  of  John  Hickathrift,  find  fault 
with  the  passionate  temper  of  Bevis  of  Southampton,  and 
loved  St.  George  for  being  Champion  of  England."     There 

1  Tom    Thumb    and    Jack    Horner   arc    also,    at    least    in    part. 
in  verse. 

Jack  Horner  was  a  pretty  lad 
Near  London  he  did  dwell, 
His  father's  heart   he   made   full   glad. 
His  mother  loved  him  well. 


246  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

were  also  stories  of  the  diabolic,  such  as  Dr.  Faiistus,  the 
long  speaking  title  of  which  must  have  been  irresistible ;  of 
superstition,  as  in  the  books  interpreting  dreams  and  moles ; 
legendary  tales  like  those  of  Robin  Hood  and  Children  in 
the  Wood;  and  historical  tales  like  Fair  Rosamond.  The 
favorites  were,  however,  romantic  tales  like  Fortunatus, 
Reynard  the  Fox,  Jack  and  the  Giants,  Tom  Hickathrift, 
and  others  mentioned  by  Steele.  Criminal  stories  like  that 
of  the  apprentice  George  Barnwell  (Youth's  Warning  Piece 
or  the  Tragicall  History  of  George  Barnwell),  and  biogra- 
phical accounts  like  those  of  Robinson  Crusoe  were  equally 
popular,  easily  taking  the  edge  off  the  rude  couplets  of 
a  chap  book  version  of  Joseph  and  his  Brethren.  The  eter- 
nal longing  of  children  for  romance  is  faithfully  reflected 
in  White's  To  the  Genius  of  Romance,  where  the  poet  names 
his  favorite  stories  with  bated  breath : 

Oh  !  thou  who,  in  my  early  youth, 
When  fancy  wore  the  garb  of  truth, 
Wert  wont  to  win  my  infant  feet.   .    .    . 

White  mentions  Robin  Hood,  Sherwood  Forest,  Greensleeve, 
and  Blue-Beard.^ 

Such  were  the  delights  of  the  eighteenth-century  house- 
hold after  the  pedlar's  pack  had  been  ransacked  (''humbler 
works,  the  pedlar's  pack  supplied,"  Parish  Register,  Part  I). 

These  are  the  Peasant's  joy,  when  placed  at  ease. 
Half  his  delighted  offspring  mount  his  knees. 

(Parish    Register,    Part    I.^ 

The  "histories"  carried  children  out  of  their  environment 
to  ages  past.     The  History  of  Thomas  Hickathrift  hardly 

^  See  Cowper   (Conversation) : 

Guy  Earl  of  Warwick  and  fair  Eleanore, 

Or   giant-killing   Jack,    would    please    me    more. 


children's  books  247 

stood  in  need  of  advertising  catches  to  commend  it  to 
children  or  even  to  their  elders : 

He  that  does  buy  this  little  book. 
Observe  what  you  in  it  do  look. 
When  you  have  read  it,  then  may  say, 
Your  money  is  not  thrown  away. 

The  opening  sentence  is  characteristic  in  its  ability  to 
transport  the  child  into  a  strange  world  of  adventure:  "In 
the  reign  before  William  the  Conqueror,  I  have  heard  in 
ancient  history  that  there  dwelt  a  man  in  the  parish  of  the 
Isle  of  Ely,  in  the  county  of  Cambridge,  whose  name  was 
Thomas  Hickathrift,"  and  so  on  to  the  end  of  the  romanti- 
cally crammed  sentence  which  is  at  the  same  time  the 
paragraph. 

In  addition  to  chap  books  not  specifically  intended  for 
their  perusal,  children  found  delight  in  appropriating  stand- 
ard works  of  literature  composed  for  their  elders.  With 
no  capacity  for  appreciating  irony  or  satire,  child  nature 
could  nevertheless  satisfy  its  craving  for  adventure  in 
Gulliver  s  Travels;  ^  and  w^ith  an  entire  ignorance  of  Bun- 
yan's  allegorical  intention,  children  might  yet  be  fascinated 
by  the  simple  concreteness  with  which  the  adventures  of 
Christian  are  set  forth.  Crusoe's  adventures  were  early 
condensed  to  the  limits  of  the  chap  book,  but  there  is  at  the 
same  time  evidence  that  Defoe's  account  found  an  early  if 
not  immediate  place  in  the  affections  of  schoolboys.  More 
generous  than  twentieth-century  librarians,  those  who  had 
the  supervision  of  children's  reading  seem  to  have  prac- 
ticed what  Wordsworth  stated  as  an  absolute  conviction, 
*'that  children  will  derive  most  benefits  from  books  which 
are  not  unworthy  the  perusal  of  persons  of  any  age."     This 

1  Wordsworth  read  and  enjoyed  Gulliver's  Travels  at  Hawkes- 
head. 


248  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

attitude  is  in  keeping  with  the  shrewd  observation  attributed 
to  Dr.  Johnson:  "Babies  do  not  want  to  hear  about  babies; 
they  Hke  to  be  told  about  giants  and  castles,  and  of  some- 
what which  can  stretch  and  stimulate  their  little  minds." 
In  fact,  Wordsworth's  adventures  in  the  ''slender  Abstract" 
of  Arabian  Nights  (which  may  well  have  been  a  chap  book 
version),  and  in  other  tales,  had  in  his  eyes  a  moral  value. 
In  the  episode  of  the  drowned  man  in  Esthwaite,  Words- 
worth in  The  Prelude  pays  tribute  to  the  genii  of  romance 
for  having  accustomed  his  imagination  to  such  scenes  as 
took  place  when  the  drowned  man  rose  to  the  surface,  with 
the  result  that  the  boy  was  not  unnecessarily  frightened  or 
moved  by  the  gruesome  sight  near  Hawkeshead.  The 
''little  yellow,  canvas-covered  book"  may  have  represented  a 
truncated  form  akin  to  that  of  the  chap  books;  at  any  rate 
the  poet  was  so  delighted  that  he  saved  his  pocket  money  in 
the  hope  of  buying  an  unabridged  edition  of  the  Arabian 
Nights.  The  vast  growth  of  interest  in  Oriental  literature 
during  the  eighteenth  century  served  to  open  the  inex- 
haustible storehouses  of  Eastern  tales  to  the  young  roman- 
ticist poet.  ^  The  deep  impression  made  on  Wordsworth  is 
revealed  in  Vaudracoiir  and  Julia,  where  he  compares  with 
those  of  Arabian  fiction  the  "wonders  that  were  wrought" 
for  the  youth  in  the  poem.  So  attached  were  romanticist 
poets  in  their  youth  to  material  from  the  distant  past,  that 
Russell  blames  Cervantes  for  ruthlessly  tearing  aside  the 
veil  woven  by  genius  of  yore.- 

Cowper's  panegyric  on  his  childhood  friend  Pilgrim  has 
already  been  noticed.     Mrs.  Piozzi  has  left  on  record  how 

1  Consult    The    Oriental    Talc    in    England    in    the    Eighteenth 
Century,  by  Martha  Pike  Conant. 

2  Don   Quixote  was  one  of  the  books  read  frequently  by   chil- 
dren in  the  first  half  of  the  century. 


CIIILDRKX'S    r.OOKS  249 

Johnson  treated  iiishop  Percy's  little  daughter  during  a 
conversation  on  the  merits  of  P/7<;r;;;/'^  Proii^rcss,  which  he 
valued  highly.  He  asked  her  what  she  thought  of  the 
book.  "The  child  answered  that  she  had  not  read  it.  *No! 
then  I  would  not  give  one  farthing  for  you,'  and  he  set  her 
down  and  took  no  further  notice  of  her."  Long  before 
Crabbe  noticed  "Bunyan's  famed  i)ilgrim"  on  the  cottage 
shelf,  Franklin  had  saved  his  pennies  to  buy  a  copy. 
Southey  charmingly  recalls  childhood  hours  spent  with  his 
cousin  Margaret  in  reading  Pilgri)}i's  Progress. 

Somerville's  Fortiinc-Huntcr  bears  early  witness  to  the 
popularity  of  Robinson  Crusoe  as  a  boy's  book ;  it  supple- 
mented the  stirring  tales  told  by  the  hero's  nurse.  His 
imagination  had  been  so  excited  that 

Whate'er  he  read  or  heard  of  old, 
Whate'er  his  nurse  or  Crusoe  told, 
Each    tragic    scene    his    eyes   behold. 

Its  value  as  a  boy's  book  in  the  schools  had  evidently  been 
recognized  in  England  before  Basedow  in  Germany  and 
Rousseau  in  France  or  the  Edgeworths  in  England  had 
given  their  pedagogical  approval  by  adopting  it.  At  Man- 
chester Grammar  School,  Robinson  Crusoe  was,  together 
with  Swift's  Gulliver,  purchased  for  the  Holiday  Library 
between  1725  and  1740,  and  President  Samuel  Johnson  of 
Columbia  University  included  Robinson  Crusoe  in  the  un- 
published manuscript  list  of  his  readings  for  the  year  1735- 
1736,  when  he  was  at  the  age  of  nine.  When  H.  K.  White 
wrote  in  one  of  his  letters  (1800),  "Robinson  Crusoe  is  al- 
lowed to  be  the  best  novel  for  youth  in  the  English  lan- 
guage," he  probably  at  the  same  time  gave  it  the  stamp  of 
his  personal  approval  as  well  as  reflected  the  judgment  of 
the  new  pedagogy.  Robert  Bloomfield's  The  Farmers  Boy 
has  the  line 

And  strolls  the  Crusoe  of  the  lonely  fields. 


250  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Wordsworth  had  read  the  book,  for  in  Enterprise  he  re- 
marks upon  ''the  various  turns  of  Crusoe's  fate." 

The  Hermit,  or  the  unparalleled  Sufferings  and  surprising 
adventures  of  Philip  Quarll,  of  which  Miss  Yonge  says  that 
it  ''comes  to  us  with  the  reputation  of  being  by  Daniel  De- 
foe," and  of  an  edition  of  which  Edwin  Pearson  has  found 
notice  as  early  as  1727,  was  another  of  the  books  appro- 
priated by  children.  ^  It  had  reached  a  twelfth  edition  in 
1780,  and  Crabbe  noted  it  among  the  books  on  the  cottage 
shelf : 

Of  Hermit  Quarll  we  read,  in  island  rare, 

Far  from  mankind  and  seeming  far  from  care; 

Safe   from  all   want,   and   sound   in   every  limb. 

(Parish    Register,   Part    \) 

The  edition  of  1786  shows  the  story  to  be  a  curious  mix- 
ture of  the  picaresque  and  the  Rousseau  love  of  primitive 
simplicity  and  vegetative  felicity.  The  first  part,  especially, 
is  in  the  temper  of  the  return  to  nature.  The  second  part 
is  realistic,  and  Quarll's  matrimonial  entanglements — he 
has  three  wives — seem  hardly  to  offer  fit  provender  for  the 
youthful  imagination.  The  third  part,  written  in  the  spirit 
of  Crusoe's  experiences  on  the  island,  is  interspersed  with 
interpretations  of  dreams,  prayers  of  thanksgiving  for  a 
kind  Providence,  and  a  morbid  introspective  strain  and 
analysis  of  sin  that  are  bound  up  with  vehement  denun- 
ciation of  worldliness  and  luxury,  and  a  hatred  of  all  things 
French.  The  book  contains  in  extended  form  many  of  the 
themes  of  superstition,  edification,  and  romantic  adventure, 
together  with  interest  in  criminal  matters,  to  be  found  in 
chap  books.  Voracious  young  readers  no  doubt  came  upon 
it  in  such  a  window  bookshelf  as  Wordsworth  describes  in 
The    Excursion.     Wordsworth's    and    Crabbe's    experience 

1  Banbury  Chap  Books,  Edwin  Pearson,  London,  1890. 


children's  books  251 

with  borrowed  books  must  have  been  typical  in  the  decades 
from  the  seventies  to  the  nineties.  Wordsworth  remarks  in 
Guilt  and  Sorrozv: 

I  read,  and  loved  the  books  in  which  I  read ; 

For  books  in  every  neighboring  house  I  sought, 

And  nothing  to  my  mind  a  sweeter  pleasure  brought.  ^ 

Although  the  roots  of  our  highly  developed  modern  in- 
dustry of  juvenile  book  publication  are  to  be  found  in  the 
chap  books,  John  Newberry  was  the  first  publisher  to  set 
up  as  a  producer  of  books  for  the  amusement  of  children. 
Combining  the  functions  of  a  dispenser  of  drugs  and  me- 
dicines with  those  of  a  publisher  of  books  intended  speci- 
fically for  children,  Newberry  flourished  at  the  sign  of  the 
Bible  and  Sun  in  Paul's  Churchyard.  From  the  fact  that 
Goldsmith  and  Johnson  wrote  for  him,  his  activities  have 
been  especially  interesting  to  students  of  juvenile  literature. 
His  ability  to  advertise  his  wares  in  the  newspapers  gave 
wide  circulation  to  his  "Circle  of  Sciences,"  and  to  the  little 
volumes  which  appealed  to  children.  Although  he  too 
emphasized  the  moral  feature  common  in  children's  books, 

1  In   the   royal   household,  books   were   supplemented   by   stage 
performances  of  Shakespeare's  plays.     Mr.  J.   Buncombe's  On  the 
Death  of  Frederick  Prince  of  Wales  (1751),  which  is  not  as  barren 
as  most  occasional  verse  of  its  type,  gives  an  intimate  glimpse  of  the 
young  prince  at  a  performance  of  Romeo  and  Juliet: 
When  late  I  saw  thee  drop  a  tender  tear 
Of  feeling  sympathy  on  Juliet's  bier. 
And  heard  thy  youthful  train  with  sighs  confess 
Humane  compassion  at  her  feigned  distress. 
Poets   in  general  preferred  the  cottage   setting  for  the   story   hour. 
Mr.  Buncombe's  lines  are  conceived  in  a  different  mood  : 
No  longer  now,  in  Kew's  or  Cliefden's  grove. 
That  prattling  train  shall  with  thee  sportive  rove ; 
No  more  their  stories  shall  thy  walks  beguile. 
Nor  thou  repay  those  stories  with  a  smile. 


252  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

his  publications  from  1745  onward  mark  the  beginning  of 
juvenile  publications  avowedly  designed  to  furnish  amuse- 
ment as  well  as  instruction. 

He  improved  on  the  flimsy  chap  book  by  introducing  the 
cover  feature,  gilt  ornamentation  being  an  added  attraction. 
His  skilfully  worded  pufifs  had  strong  pulling  power  in 
homes  in  which  there  were  children.  The  following  adver- 
tisement appeared  in  the  London  Chronicle  for  Dec.  19 — 
Jan.  I,  1765 :  "The  Philosophers,  PoHticians,  Necroman- 
cers, and  the  learned  in  every  faculty  are  desired  to  ob- 
serve that  on  the  first  of  January,  being  New  Year's  day 
(oh,  that  we  all  may  lead  new  lives!),  Mr.  Newberry  in- 
tends to  publish  the  following  important  volumes,  bound 
and  gilt,  and  hereby  invites  all  his  little  friends  who  are  good 
to  call  for  them  at  the  Bible  and  Sun,  in  St.  Paul's  Church- 
\-ard,  but  those  who  are  naughty  io  have  none."  ^  Later  in 
the  century,  the  Banbury  publisher.  Rusher,  used  rhymes 
to  advertise  his  publications  : 

See  Jack   in  his   study 
Is  writing  a  book 
As  pretty  as  this  is 
In  which  you  may  look. 

The  price  is  a  penny 
For  girls  and  for  boys. 
There's  more  too  at  Rusher's, 
And  pictures  and  toys. 

And  when  with  much  pleasure 
You've   read   them   all  o'er 
Then  hasten  to  Rusher's 
He's  printing  some  more.  - 

^  Quoted  in  Children's  Books  and  Reading.  l)y  Montrose  J. 
Moses. 

-  Quoted  by  Pearson,  op.  cit. 


children's  dooks  253 

Newberry's  pioneer  work  is  notable  because  he  published 
Goody  Tzi'o-SJwcs  and  Tommy  Trip  in  a  form  accredited  to 
Goldsmith,  whose  name  is  therefore  associated  with  the 
first  attempts  to  publish  juvenile  classics.'  Washinf^ton 
Irving  is  severe  in  his  censures  when  he  writes  that  New- 
berry "coined  the  brains  of  authors  in  the  times  of  their 
exigency,  and  made  them  pay  dear  for  the  plank  put  out  to 
keep  them  from  drowning."  Yet  when  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds 
called  at  Green  Arbour  Court,  where  Goldsmith  at  the  top 
of  Break  Neck  Steps  and  at  the  end  of  Turn  Again  Lane 
wrote  for  children,  he  found  this  couplet : 

By  sports  like  these  are  all  their  cares  beguiled, 
The  sports  of  children  satisfy  the  child. 

It  was  in  these  squalid  surroundings  that  Goldsmith 
probably  edited  Newberry's  children's  magazine  The  Lilli- 
putiau.  Documentary  evidence  and  receipts  in  Goldsmith's 
handwriting  seem  to  exist,  showing  that  he  wrote  abridged 
histories  of  England  and  Greece,  as  well  as  some  abridg- 
ments of  Old  and  New  Testament  stories,  Robinson  Cru- 
soe, Pamela,  Clarissa  Harlowe,  and  Sir  Charles  Grandison, 
— all  published  'by  Newberry.  x\lthough  it  is  difficult  to 
think  of  the  good-hearted  but  ponderous  Johnson  ( who  was 
accustomed  to  make  little  fishes  talk  like  whales)  in  the 
role  of  writer  or  even  editor  of  children's  books,  it  seems 
that  there  are  in  the  Jupp  and  the  Hugo  collections  several 
children's  books  edited  and  prefaced  by  him.  At  any  rate 
Johnson  and  Goldsmith  must  have  discussed  the  problems 
of  writing  for  young  readers,  for  Boswell  recounts  how 
Goldsmith  expressed  the  wish  that  he  might  be  able  to  make 

^  Consult  Charles  Weisli's  facsimile  of  the  1766  edition  of 
Goody  Tzvo-Shocs.  See  also  his  A  Bookseller  of  the  Last  Cen- 
tury, and  a  good  catalogue  of  Newberry's  books  for  children  in 
On  Some  Books  for  Children  of  the  Last  Century. 


254  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

fishes,  animals,  and  birds  talk  or  appear  to  talk  ''for  the 
amusement  of  children." 

The  popularity  of  Newberry's  books  was  greatest  be- 
tween 1750  and  1770.  After  this  the  growth  and  popu- 
larity of  systems  of  education  for  children,  and  moral  tales 
which  found  a  place  in  such  systems  of  home  education, 
tended  to  crowd  out  fairy  tales  and  stories  of  adventure. 
The  pure  delight  in  adventure  for  its  own  sake  was  great- 
est throughout  the  middle  decades  of  the  century.  The  de- 
lightful attitude  expressed  in  Clarissa  Harlozve  reveals  the 
joy  of  children  over  such  publications  as  those  of  New- 
berry, which  amused  as  much  as  they  pedagogued.  "I, 
said  she,  had  always,  from  a  girl,  a  taste  for  reading,  though 
it  were  but  Mother  Goose,  ^  and  concerning  fairies   (and 

1  Althoug'h  the  origin  of  Mother  Goose  rhymes  and  their 
popularity  in  England  need  close  study  before  statements  can  be 
made  with  accuracy,  it  seems,  according  to  available  evidence,  that 
they  were  of  French  origin.  The  designation  "Mother  Goose"  is 
first  heard  in  the  seventeenth  century,  when  the  contes  were  first 
published  singly,  after  which  Perrault  in  1687  published  Histoires 
ou  Contes  du  Terns  Passe  avec  des  Moralitez,  the  authorship  of 
which  he  ascribed  to  his  son  Perrault  Darmancour.  The  frontis- 
piece pictures  an  old  woman  regaling  a  group  of  listeners  with 
stories,  and  by  her  side  is  a  placard  on  which  is  lettered : 

CONTES 
DE    MA 

MERE 

LOYE 
It  seems  that  a  translation  of  Perrault's  contes  was  published  in 
English  in  1729  and  another  in  1745.  It  must  have  been  one  of 
these,  or  an  earlier  version,  with  which  Richardson  was  acquainted. 
Attempts  have  been  made  to  identify  Goldsmith,  whose  favorite  song 
is  said  to  have  been  "An  old  woman  tossed  in  a  blanket,  seventeen 
times  as  high  as  the  moon",  as  editor  of  Newberry's  edition,  the 
seventh  edition  of  which  appeared  in  1777. — The  Mother  Goose 
rhymes  suggest  an  early  eighteenth-century  origin  of  the  English 
version. 


children's  books  255 

then  she  took  genteelly  a  pinch  of  snuff)  :  could  but  my 
parents  have  let  go  as  fast  as  I  pulled,  I  should  have  been 
a  very  happy  creature."  It  was  fated  that  fairy  tales  and 
stories  of  adventure  were  to  triumph  as  pabulum  for  children 
in  the  nineteenth  century;  but  they  suffered  a  temporary 
eclipse  in  the  moral  tales,  which,  although  they  were  in- 
tended to  interest  the  child,  were  chiefly  designed  to  instruct. 
Written  largely  under  the  stimulus  of  the  new  pedago- 
gical activities  which  resulted  from  the  enthusiasm  of  Rous- 
seau, the  moral  tales  were  nevertheless  not  representative 
of  the  fundamentals  of  his  teachings.  As  to  content  they 
lean  towards  Rousseau  in  the  fervid  interest  shown  by  these 
amateurs  in  pedagogy  in  things  as  a  substitute  for  mere 
word  education.  But  even  this  feature  probably  resulted 
from  the  native  spirit  of  protest  against  the  classics.  Moral 
tales  were  practical  in  the  sense  that  they  utilized  the  results 
of  the  scientific  aw^akening  that  had  carried  children  as  well 
as  men  into  fields  and  woods  rather  than  into  libraries.  The 
method,  however,  was  that  of  the  old  pedagogy.  While 
poets  had  been  condemning  exclusive  attention  to  the  clas- 
sics and  book  learning,  they  had  been  careful,  as  is  obvious 
especially  in  Tirocinium,  to  retain  the  emphasis  on  the 
necessity  of  moral  training.  The  moral  tale  as  exemplified 
in  one  of  its  most  popular  manifestations,  in  Thomas  Day's 
Sandford  and  Mertoun  (1783-1789),  was  at  bottom  noth- 
ing more  than  a  small  encyclopedia.  ^  Scientific  interest  in 
the  world  of  naitural  phenomena  supplied  most  of  the  subject 
matter,  but  the  intention  was  religious  and  humanitarian  at 
the  same  time  that  the  child  was  crammed  with  facts. 

1  See  also  Percival's  A  Father's  Instructions  (1775),  and  the 
works  of  Mrs.  Trimmer,  Hannah  More,  Mrs.  Barbauld,  and  the 
Edgeworths.  Sandford  and  Mertoun  is  more  readable  than  the  aver- 
age moral  tale  because  Day's  style  was  obviously  influenced  by  chap 
books. 


256  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  conception  of  childhood  even  in  Day  and  the 
Edgeworths  was  still  expressed  in  terms  of  the  institutional 
child.  The  aim  was  to  make  the  child  over,  and  the  result 
was  an  infant  prodigy  in  place  of  the  natural  child  who  was 
the  ideal  of  Rousseau.  Rousseau's  endeavor  to  lose  time 
with  the  child  before  the  age  of  twelve,  finds  no  recognition 
in  the  moral  tales.  Although  influenced  by  Rousseau  and 
the  new  spirit,  these  writers  were,  nevertheless,  proceeding 
not  on  the  fundamentals  of  Rousseau  (which  insisted  that 
the  child  was  not  a  little  man)  but  on  the  traditional  plan 
which  treated  him  as  though  he  had  to  be  made  over  into 
the  likeness  of  an  adult  as  soon  as  possible.  The  moral 
tale  was  in  fact  a  perversion  or  misapplication  of  the  theo- 
ries of  Rousseau,  for  its  sponsors  proceeded  with  the  method 
revealed  in  the  traditional  fables  which,  as  Somerville 
noted  early  in  the  century,  had  in  the  happy  plan  of  Greece 
and  Rome  "taught  the  brute  to  pedagogue  the  man."  Al- 
though writers  of  moral  tales  substituted  modern  material 
for  the  contents  of  the  ancient  fable,  they  believed  with 
Byrom  (Ape  and  the  Fox)  that 

Old  Aesop  so  famous  was  certainly  right 

In  the  way  that  he  took  to  instruct  and  delight, 

* 

He  encouraged,  by  his  fables,  the  attention  of  youth, 
And  forced  even  fiction  to  tell  them  the  truth. 

A  didactic  purpose  is  revealed  on  every  page  of  a  neat 
little  volume  of  poems  issued  by  Marshall  in  a  second  edi- 
tion in  1789:  Poems  on  Various  Subjects  for  the  Amuse- 
ment of  Youth.  It  is  bound  in  half  calf  and  is  illustrated 
by  attractive  oval  woodcuts  executed  by  Bewick.  The 
poems,  which  are  pervaded  by  the  characteristic  humani- 
tarianism  of  the  age,  are  written  at  children  in  a  spirit  of 
undisguised  didacticism.     In  such  a  poem  as  From  a  Gen- 


CHII.DRKX'S    r.OOKS  257 

tlcinaii  to  his  Soqi  on  his  Confining  a  Bird,  the  intention  is 
to  shame  the  child.  The  opening  Hnes  with  their  ad  homi- 
ncm  attack  preclude  from  the  start  anything  but  a  superior 
attitude  of  teaching: 

Horace,  what  greater  punishment. 
Cou'd  I  inflict,  my  boy.  on  thee? 
And  tell  me  what  wou'd  grieve  thee  more. 
Than  thus  to  lose  thy  liberty? 

Yet  thou  can'st  take  a  savage  joy, 
To  view  thy  captive's  fond  desires ; 
Thou  can'st  with  unrelenting  heart, 
Behold  him  beat  against  his   wires. 

The  boy  is  plainly  lectured  in  place  of  being  led  to  feel  a 
community  of  interest. 

In  The  Domestic  Loss:  or  tJie  Death  of  a  Dog  there  is 
profuse  sentimental  weeping  wdiich  is  itself,  however,  some- 
what out  of  keeping  with  the  bald  moralizing  and  philo- 
sophizing that  are  stretched  out  to  the  length  of  twenty-five 
stanzas.  The  distinction  between  child  reason  and  animal 
instinct  makes  the  child  talk  priggishly  in  a  self-congratu- 
latory vein  that  recalls  Watts. 

If  led  by  instinct's  voice  alone, 
That  instinct  gratitude  could  teach: 
Then  blessed  with  reason  to  reflect. 
To  what  perfection  should  I  reach? 

How    thankful    should    my    heart    o'erflow. 
For  mercies  that  adorn  the  )nind. 
For  thought,  imagination,  sf>eech, 
The  privilege  of  human   kind/ 

The  difference  between  Watts  in  1720  and  these  i>oems  in 
1789  is  that  the  subject  matter  has  in  the  meantime  become 
secularized.  The  approach  to  the  child  mind  is  exactly  that 
of  the  first  quarter  of  the  century.     The  Xegro  Beggar  is 


258  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

likewise  written  purely  to  start  a  young  meditation  on  the 
humanitarian  theme. 

What  is  pity?  she  asked  (as  she  wiped  from  her  face 
The  tear  which  bestowed  an  additional  grace). 

Other  poems  like  On  a  Young  Gentleman  being  Desir- 
ous of  a  Goldfinch,  The  Drowned  Flies,  Young  Philemon 
Accused  by  his  Sister  of  Cruelty,  and  Verses  Occasioned 
by  a  Young  Gentleman's  Hiding  his  Sister  s  Squirrel,  are 
conceived  in  the  spirit  of  Maria  Edgeworth  and  Mrs.  Sher- 
wood, who  used  the  most  trivial  domestic  incidents  to  point 
an  obvious  moral. 

Mrs.  Barbauld's  Hymns  in  Prose  for  Children  (1781) 
aimed  to  ''impress  devotional  feelings  as  early  as  possible 
on  the  infant  mind  ...  by  connecting  religion  with  a 
variety  of  sensible  objects,  with  all  that  he  sees,  all  he 
hears  ...  to  lay  the  best  foundation  for  practical  devo- 
tion in  future  life."  Although  Mrs.  Barbauld  was  influ- 
enced by  the  scientific  awakening — and  therefore  ought  to 
belong  to  those  who  teach  through  direct  observation — the 
Preface  indicates  the  conservative  source  of  her  inspiration. 
Among  the  many  ''rational"  books  for  children,  she  finds 
none  really  suitable  "except  indeed  Dr.  Watts's  Hymns  for 
Children,"  and  "These  are  in  pretty  general  use."  Her 
hymns  are  intended  to  be  committed  to  memory  and  re- 
cited, so  that  her  pupils  are  in  reality  not  facing  "sensible 
objects"  but  are  still  dependent  on  book  learning. 

The  ingenuity  exercised  by  these  writers,  including 
Maria  Edgeworth,  in  crowding  miscellaneous  facts  into  the 
child  mind,  while  at  the  same  time  injecting  moral  and  re- 
ligious instruction,  is  seen  in  the  omnium  gatherum  that 
makes  up  Hymn  VHI.  In  the  opening  paragraph  the  cot- 
tage motive  together  with  the  return  at  eve  serves  the  pur- 
pose of  inculcating  thrift,  industry,  and  affection  for  parents. 


children's  books  259 

"See  where  stands  the  cottage  of  the  labourer  covered  with 
warm  thatch.  The  mother  is  spinning;  at  the  door;  the 
young  children  sport  before  her  on  the  grass;  the  elder 
ones  learn  to  labour,  and  be  obedient ;  the  father  worketh  to 
provide  them  food :  either  he  tilleth  the  ground,  or  he  gath- 
ereth  in  the  corn,  or  shaketh  his  ripe  apples  from  the  trees. 
His  children  run  to  meet  him  when  he  cometh  home,  and 
his  wife  prepareth  the  wholesome  meal."  Without  warning 
the  child  finds  himself  in  an  exposition  of  what  constitutes  a 
family.  Next  he  is  instructed  in  what  constitutes  a  vil- 
lage, with  the  closing  sentence :  "This  is  a  village ;  see  where 
it  stands  enclosed  in  green  shade,  and  the  tall  spire  peeps 
above  the  trees."  Then  follows  a  lesson  in  geography 
which  carries  the  child  from  pole  to  pole.  The  tropics 
suggest  the  negro  mother  and  her  child  "pining  in  captivity." 
In  the  concluding  rhythms,  the  Monarch,  who  rules  many 
states  (a  "hundred  states"),  is  adjured  to  remember  that 
he  is  responsible  to  God. 

One  phase  of  her  method  is  well  illustrated  in  Hymn  IX, 
where  she  interests  the  child  in  those  grains  of  sand  in  each 
of  which  the  naturalistic  Blake  saw  a  world.  She  notes 
flowers  growing  "in  the  hard  stone"  of  the  wall,  an  obser- 
vation made  in  a  far  different  mood  from  that  of  Tenny- 
son, who  connects  the  riddle  of  the  universe  with  the  flower 
in  the  crannied  wall.  Her  devotional  aims  do  not  succeed 
in  crowding  out  the  universal  passion  for  fact  cramming, 
which  came  with  the  new  enthusiasm  for  a  novel  world  of 
scientific  facts,  and  which  must  have  persisted  to  the  time  of 
Dickens,  who  satirizes  the  methods  of  Gradgrind  in  Hard 
Times.  The  encyclopedic  nature  of  moral  tales  and  juve- 
nile publications  is  well  illustrated  in  Mrs.  Barbauld's  prose 
poetry.  The  child  who  can  absorb  the  jumble  of  botanical, 
zo-ological,  astronomical,  geographical,  and  other  observa- 
tions, is  indeed  an  infant  polyhistor. 


260  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

It  is  small  wonder  that  Wordsworth  condemned  fact 
cramming,  and  that  Charles  Lamb  spoke  contemptuously  of 
this  sort  of  thing  as  "stuff"  which  had  crowded  from  the 
shelves  of  booksellers  the  fairy  tales  of  Newberry.  Words- 
worth deplored  the  lack  of  imagination  in  such  publica- 
tions, and  with  justice,  as  the  following  passage  indicates: 
''Many  towns,  and  a  large  extent  of  country,  make  a  king- 
dom; it  is  enclosed  by  mountains;  it  is  divided  by  rivers;  it 
is  washed  by  seas ;  the  inhabitants  thereof  are  countrymen ; 
they  speak  the  same  language ;  they  make  war  and  peace  to- 
gether ;  a  king  is  the  ruler  thereof.  Many  kingdoms  and 
countries  full  of  people,  and  islands,  and  large  continents, 
and  different  climates  make  up  this  whole  world- — God 
governeth  it."  If  Wordsworth  heard  a  small  child  recite 
this  from  memory,  he  might  well  be  moved  to  reproach 
writers  of  the  type,  who,  however  good  their  intentions,  did 
not  reverence  child  nature. 

That  these  writers  were  not  interested  in  the  child  in  the 
same  sense  as  Rousseau,  is  suggested  by  the  fact  that  Mrs. 
Trimmer  and  Mrs.  Sherwood  were  the  last  to  bear  witness 
in  England  against  fairies.  The  bold  and  obvious 
didacticism  of  later  moral  tales  became  even  less  attractive 
when  for  the  influence  of  Madame  Genlis  and  Madame  d' 
Epinay  were  substituted  the  dissection  and  analysis  to  which 
the  child's  mind  and  soul  were  subjected  in  dialogues  writ- 
ten for  him  under  the  influence  of  Campe  and  Salzmann  in 
the  nineties.  Mary  Wollstonecraft  found  in  Salzmann's 
Elements  of  Morality  the  true  method  of  forming  the  heart 
and  character  of  the  child.  In  this  spirit  the  minutest  and 
most  insignificant  incidents  of  family  life  were  moralized, 
with  the  inevitable  moral  that  prosperity  results  from  order 
and  propriety,  and  punishment  and  unhappiness  from  their 
opposites.     More  attractive  than  the  others  is  the  Calendar 


children's  nooKS  261 

of  Nature  by  John  Aikin,  in  the  siX)ntaneous  bits  of  illus- 
trative verse ;  but  the  fundamental  attitude  is  the  same. 
These  writers  were  essentially  on  the  same  basis  as  Isaac 
Watts.  At  all  events  they  reveal  no  ability  to  understand 
and  apply  the  fundamentals  of  Rousseau  as  revealed  in  the 
advice  given  to  the  tutor  of  Madame  d'Epinay's  son :  "a 
child's  character  should  not  be  changed  ;  besides,  one  could 
not  do  it  if  one  would,  and  the  greatest  success  you  could 
achieve  would  be  to  make  a  hypocrite  of  him.  .  .  .  No,  sir, 
you  must  make  the  best  of  the  character  nature  gave  him  ; 
that  is  all  that  is  required  of  you."  ^ 

Except  for  Blake's  lyrics,  which  were  not  widely  known, 
the  situation  at  the  close  of  the  century  is  such  as  to  justify 
not  only  the  protests  of  Lamb  but  also  the  severe  condem- 
nation of  Wordsworth.  The  writers  of  moral  tales  were 
not  true  followers  of  Rousseau.  They  had  all  the  passion 
for  teaching  and  making  the  child  over  which  Rousseau 
had  condemned.  They  were  influenced  by  him  only  in 
externals,  and  were  as  didactic  as  Watts  and  the  classical 
masters.  It  remained  for  William  Blake,  who  was  influ- 
enced by  advanced  ideas  in  philosophy,  politics,  and  theo- 
logy, to  give  voice  to  the  philosophy  of  natural  goodness 
and  universal  benevolence  in  the  simple  accents  of  child- 
hood itself.  In  his  lyrics,  children  themselves  for  the  first 
time  in  the  century  take  up  the  motives  developed  by  poets 
during  the  preceding  decades,  and  speak  in  their  own  lan- 
guage, bringing  home  in  their  childish  accents  the  pleas  for 
universal   benevolence    and    the   protests   against   restraint. 

1  Quoted  in  Jean  Jacques  Rousseau  by  Jiilcs  Lcniailre.  trans- 
lated by  Jeanne  Mairet,  p.  218. 


CHAPTER  VI 
WILUAM    BLAKE 

The  high  estimation  in  which  the  early  poems  of  Blake 
are  held  seems  all  the  more  deserved  when  it  is  realized  that 
he  wrote  his  delightful  lyrics  about  children  in  the  very 
years  when  moral  tales  in  prose  and  verse  were  at  the 
height  of  their  popularity.  Blake's  lyrics  have  a  primeval 
freshness  that  has  attracted  readers  who  are  not  aware 
of  the  larger  body  of  literature  written  during  the  eighteenth 
century  for  and  about  children.  As  a  result,  his  poems 
about  children  have  been  singled  out  as  unusual  phenomena 
in  the  days  before  Wordsworth.  To  look  upon  Blake, 
however,  as  an  odd  genius,  who  may  have  been  influenced 
by  Elizabethan  poetry  and  Swedenborg  and  Boehme,  but 
who  nevertheless  is  an  isolated  phenomenon  among  the 
poets  of  his  generation,  is  to  take  a  line  of  thought  that 
leads  to  misunderstanding  of  the  poetry  he  wrote  before 
the  tantalizing  prophetic  books.  It  is  only  by  frankly 
treating  him  as  a  poet  who  was  vitally  influenced  by  the 
thought  of  his  century  that  his  deibt  to  his  predecessors  in 
poetry,  and  his  original  contribution,  can  be  adequately 
measured.  If  treated  in  its  historical  setting,  his  poetry  on 
childhood  naturally  takes  its  place  among  the  poetry  a'bout 
children  in  the  eighteenth  century.  His  verse  clearly  re- 
veals the  influences  which  had  been  at  work  among  poets 
of  the  century. 

Although  valuable  records  that  would  throw  light  on 
the  period  before  the  appearance  of  the  prophetic  books 
have  been  destroyed,  so  that  it  is  impossible  to  reconstruct 


WII.LIAM    I'.LAKK  263 

the  earlier  period  with  the  same  accuracy  as  the  later  ones, 
critics  unanimously  recognize  in  the  earlier  publications  like 
the  Poetical  Sketches,  Blake's  indebtedness  to  predecessors 
of  the  "olden  age."  In  place,  therefore,  of  looking  only 
to  the  later  prophetic  books  to  explain  his  Songs  of  Inno- 
cence and  Songs  of  Experience,  which  are  the  only  poems 
of  Blake  that  are  widely  read,  it  will  be  more  fruitful  to 
study  them  also  in  relation  to  the  influences  which  had 
worked  upon  Blake  to  produce  the  poems  of  the  earlier 
period.  Before  he  reached  the  state  of  mind  reveale<:l  in 
the  prophetic  books,  Blake  had  read  widely  in  English 
literature,  and  his  lyrics  about  children,  begun  as  early  as 
1784,^  disclose  his  debt  to  tradition  as  fully  as  the  poems  in 
Poetical  Sketches  (1783). 

In  the  Introduction  to  the  Sojigs  of  Innocence  he  char- 
acteristically tells  how  he  was  divinely  guided  by  a  child 
sitting  on  a  cloud,  who  laughingly  directed  him  to  pipe 
songs  of  happy  cheer  and  to  write  them  in  a  book  that  all 
may  read.     He  obeyed  the  call  of  the  child : 

And  I  wrote  my  happy  songs 
Every  child  may  joy  to  hear. 

The  little  book,  the  poems  set  in  colored  engravings  made 
and  tinted  by  himself,  represents  his  contribution  to  the 
long  list  of  books  published  for  children  after  the  middle  of 
the  century.  The  format  was  in  keeping  with  juvenile 
publications  of  the  time,  but  his  engravings  added  a  novel 

1  Compare    Songs   from    an    Island    in    the   Moon    (MS.    circa 
1784): 

XII  O,  I  say,  you,  Joe. 
Throw  US  the  ball. 

(Footnote  in  the  Oxford  Edition  :  "Sung  hy  Tilly  Lally,  a  school- 
boy.") 


264  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

feature.  It  has  been  observed  in  the  preceding  pages  how 
poetry  for  children  was  increasingly  published  from  the 
days  of  Watts's  Divine  Songs  for  Children  until,  from  the 
time  of  Newberry's  innovations,  publishers  specialized  in 
juvenile  literature.  Blake  was  himself  in  touch  with  this 
trade.  In  1793  he  published  For  Children:  The  Gates  of 
Paradise.  Mr.  John  Sampson  says  of  this  publication : 
"In  its  original  form  (as  pubhshed  in  1793)  The  Gates  of 
Paradise  was  a  simple  picture-book  'For  Children,'  con- 
sisting of  a  frontispiece,  title-page,  and  sixteen  engraved 
plates  of  emblematic  designs,  the  original  pencil  sketches 
for  which  are  found  in  the  Rossetti  MS."  ^  In  1790  he 
adapted  forty-nine  engravings  for  Mary  Wollstonecraft's 
translation  of  Salzmann's  Elenientaarbuch;  and  the  follow- 
ing year  he  engraved  six  plates  for  her  Original  Stories  for 
Children  (1791).^  His  intimate  friend  Godwin  was  in- 
terested in  juvenile  Hterature,  and  later  set  up  as  a  publisher 
of  children's  books,  the  Tales  from  Shakespeare  by  Charles 
and  Mary  Lamb  issuing  from  his  press.  It  would,  there- 
fore, be  no  novelty  or  innovation  to  pubhsh  the  Songs  of 
Innocence    for   children.^     To   be   publishing    for   children 

1  The  Poetical  Works  of  William  Blake,  Oxford  University 
Press,  1914,  p.  413. 

2  Compare  also  "two  very  sweet  designs"  for  Hayley's  ''Little 
Tom  the  Sailor,"  a  series  of  illustrations  for  Hayley's  "Ballads  on 
Animals,"  and  the  charming  frontispiece  for  T,  Malkin's  A  Father's 
Memoirs  of  his  Child. 

3  Compare  Songs  of  Experience:     A  Little  Girl  Lost- 

Children  of  the  future  age, 

Reading  this  indignant  page, 

Knozv  that  in  a  former  time, 

Love,  sweet  Love,  was   thought   a   crime! 


WILLIAM    BLAKK  265 

was  to  be,  in  fact,  working  in  tlic  spirit  of  his  most  inti- 
mate friends/ 

Blake  justly  prided  himself  on  the  delight  of  children 
of  his  acquaintance  in  the  tinted  engravings  of  his  diminu- 
tive book.  The  picture  which  he  made  a  part  of  each  en- 
graving (in  itself  not  larger  than  five  by  three  inches) 
illustrates  and  complements  the  text  so  as  to  make  each 
page  a  delight  to  the  eye.  In  The  Little  Black  Boy,  the 
mother  is  sitting  under  a  tree  with  the  child  leaning  against 
her.  In  The  Lamb  the  child  is  standing  just  beyond  a  brook; 
between  the  child  and  the  barn  in  the  background  are  sheep ; 
and  a  lamb  is  looking  into  the  face  of  the  child,  whose  arms 
are  stretched  out  as  if  to  receive  it  into  his  bosom.  "I  am 
happy  to  find  a  great  majority  of  fellow-mortals  who  can 
elucidate  my  visions,  and  particularly  they  have  been  eluci- 
dated by  children,  who  have  taken  a  greater  delight  in  con- 
templating my  pictures  than  I  even  hoped."  -  Blake  was 
not  the  first  to  illustrate  juvenile  publications,  but  his  deli- 
cately tinted  engravings  are  more  attractive  than  the  justly 
admired  oval  woodcuts  of  Bewick. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  read  a  deep  symbolical  meaning 
into  the  vision  which  prompted  him  to  write  his  songs  for 
children.  Blake's  biographers  have  noted  how,  as  an  imagi- 
native child,  he  had  seen  a  vision  at  the  age  of  four  and 
again  at  the  age  of  ten ;  and  how  to  the  end  of  his  life  he 

1  "So  the  pen  that  had  once  tried  to  carve,  as  on  a  rock,  the 
story  of  Samson,  and  'the  words  of  truth,  that  all  who  pass  may 
read,'  was  now  to  become  a  delicate  reed,  and  write  simple  sen- 
tences for  any  child  to  spell  out." — William  Blake,  Poet  and  Mystic, 
by  P.  Berger,  translated  by  Daniel  W.  Conner.  Chapman  and  Hail, 
London,  1914,  page  286. 

~  Letter  of  Blake  to  the  Rev.  Dr.  Trusler,  August  2Z,  1799,  in 
Letters  of  Blake,  edited  by  G.  B.  Russell,  Methuen,  London,  page  63. 


266  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

disturbed  his  friends  by  insisting  that  he  saw  visions  in 
their  presence.  There  need  be  nothing  mysterious  or  mysti- 
fying in  this.  He  used  to  say  to  his  friends,  "You  can  see 
what  I  do  if  you  choose.  Work  up  imagination  to  the 
state  of  vision,  and  the  thing  is  done."  In  connection  with 
his  vision  of  a  fold  of  lambs  in  a  meadow,  it  is  interesting 
to  note  "the  reply  which  Blake  gave  to  a  lady  who  asked 
him  inhere  he  had  descried  this  sight.  ''Here,  madam,'  he 
replied,  touching  his  forehead :  an  answer  which  serves  to 
caution  us  against  supposing  that  he  either  accepted  as 
literal  facts  for  himself,  or  wished  to  convey  literally  to 
others,  some  of  the  visionary  or  supersensuous  incidents 
of  which  he  made  frequent  mention."  ^  If  the  reader  will 
come  to  Blake's  lyrics  without  preoccupations,  there  need 
be  no  difficulties  in  view  of  his  historical  position  and  the 
facts  of  his  life. 

Blake  is  not  the  first  among  poets  to  use  simple  lan- 
guage in  verses  intended  for  children.  From  Bishop  Ken 
and  Watts,  through  the  time  of  Newberry,  to  writers  of 
moral  tales,  there  were  poets  and  prose  writers  who  had  at 
least  endeavored  to  write  in  language  adapted  to  the  com- 
prehension of  children,  without  having  in  any  instance 
achieved  the  verisimilitude  of  the  lisping  syllables  of 
Blake's  The  Little  Black  Boy.  Like  Burns,  he  gains  force 
through  ballad  simplicity;  like  Burns,  too,  Blake  is  often 
homely  in  his  phrasing,  it  being  not  uncommon  to  find  collo- 
quial and  even  ungrammatical  expressions.^  Blake's  in- 
debtedness to  ballads  and  hymn-writers  is  obvious.  Where, 
however,  other  writers,  including  Cowper,  were  satisfied  to 
write  from  a  restricted  sectarian  point  of  view,  Blake  broke 

1  Quoted   in   Prefatory   Memoir  by   W.    M.   Rossetti    (Aldine 
Blake). 

2  P.  Berger,  op,  cit. 


WILLIAM    BLAKE  267 

away  from  the  limits  of  creed,  and  did  not  retain  the  views 
and  subject-matter  that  stamped  one  poem  as  Unitarian, 
another  as  Church  of  Enc^land,  and  still  another  as  Metho- 
dist. Variant  readinj^s  preserved  in  connection  with  Holy 
Thursday  ^  indicate  that  he  was  not  even  tempted  to  phrase 
a  narrow  view  in  place  of  a  broadly  human  conception. 
Watts  thought  he  had  broken  with  sectarian  prejudice  in 
his  songs  for  children,  but  it  remained  for  Blake  actually 
to  shake  off  traditional  fetters  and  to  look  upon  the  child 
with  the  eyes  of  a  naturalistic  philosopher,  as  in  his  Divine 
Image  (Songs  of  Innocence),  in  which  man  is  conceived  as 
the  outline  of  God,  so  that  as  every  man  discovers  a  real 
man,  he  discovers  God.- 

For  Mercy  has  a  human  heart, 
Pity  a  human  face, 

And    Love,    the    human    form    divine. 
And  Peace,  the  human  dress. 

How  far  he  is  from  the  insularity  of  Watts  and  the  bonds  of 
creed,  is  clear  in  the  inclusive  closing  stanza,  which  gives 
tender  lyric  expression  to  the  doctrine  of  universal  benevo- 
lence : 

And   all   must   love   the   human    form. 
In  heathen,  Turk,  or  Jew ; 
Where    Mercy,    Love,    and    Pity   dwell 
There  God  is  dwelling  too. 

1  Songs  of  Innocence. 

2  Gardner,  Vision  and  Vesture,  p.  6o. — Compare  also  Auguries 
of  Innocence: 

God  appears,  and  God  is  Lig-ht, 

To  those  poor  souls  who  dwell   in   Night; 

But  does  a  Human  Form  display 

To  those  who  dwell  in  realms  of  Day. 


268  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Blake  represents  the  culmination  of  those  phases  of  the 

I  movement  that  tended  to  emphasize  childhood  in  connection 
with  the  insistence  on  universal  benevolence  and  freedom 
from  institutional  restraint.  Blake  has  taken  up  the  mo- 
tives of  the  childhood  theme,  and  by  passing  them  through 
the  fiery  alembic  of  his  genius  has  given  them  the  finality 
of  phrasing  that,  ordinarily,  only  a  master  poet  can  achieve. 
But  before  a  master  poet  may  write,  there  must  be  a  period 
of  preparation.  If  the  reader  who  wishes  to  find  childhood 
in  the  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century  turns  only  to  Blake, 
it  will  seem  as  though  Blake  had  indeed  conceived  wholly  in 
a  spirit  of  originality,  when  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  is  but  the 
natural  outcome  of  forces  at  work  for  three  quarters  of  a 
century.  In  the  following  paragraphs  it  is  the  purpose 
to  indicate  how  Blake  grew  out  of  the  eighteenth  century 
in  his  attitude  toward  childhood  and  how  he  enriched 
established  motives  and  gave  them  true  lyrical  expression. 

In  Songs  of  Innocence  (1789)  he  gives  his  vision  of 
children  w^ho  are  in  a  perfect  state  of  happiness :  in  Songs  of 
Experience  (1794)  d^nd  Auguries  of  Innocence  (1801-1803), 
and  also  in  certain  lyrics  in  the  Pickering  Manuscript,  he 
protests  against  conditions  that  warp  life  from  its  true  in- 
tent. Before  1790  Blake  still  wrote  w^ith  the  heart  of  a 
child.     lnSQngSMlJMW.cencejht  zh^^^^^  happy 

...because  he  is  in  spontaneous  harmony  with  nature.  In 
Songs  of  Experience  and  Auguries  of  Tnnocence',  Blake 
recognizes  disturbing  elements  in  the  realm  of  nature  in 
so  far  as  they  affect  the  child.  Like  benevolist  poets,  he 
did  not  attempt  a  consistent  application  of  natural  goodness 

iand  universal  benevolence,  but  recognized  the  intervention 
of  facts.  Like  his  predecessors  and  contemporaries,  he  pro- 
tested vehemently  against  conditions  and  practices  which 
he  held  responsible  for  unhappiness  and  suffering. 


I" 


WILLIAM    RLAKK  269 

With  the  protest  ai^ainst  school  restraints  i)iit  upon  the 
child,  Blake  merges  a  tender  regret  which  in  the  mood  of 
the  universal  benevolists  he  brings  home  to  the  reader  in 
an  image  from  bird  life.  With  a  simplicity  that  mocks 
analysis,  he  subtly  identifies  bird  and  child.  Burns  alone 
among  those  who  after  Thomson  pleaded  for  animals,  ap- 
proaches the  tenderness  and  natural  magic  of  Blake.  In 
The  Schoolboy  (Soiigs  of  Experience),  the  child  loves  to 
rise  on  a  summer  morn  when  birds  are  singing  on  every 
tree ;  but  to  go  to  school  and  to  sit  "under  a  cruel  eye  out- 
worn" drives  all  joy  away. 

How  can  the  bird  that  is  born  for  joy 

Sit  in  a  cage  and  sing? 

How  can  a  child,  when  fears  annoy, 

But  droop  his  tender  wing. 

And  forget  his  youthful  spring? 

The  difference  between  Songs  of  Innocence  and  Songs 
of  Experience  is  indicated  in  the  engraved  frontispieces 
executed  by  Blake.  In  that  for  the  first  series,  young  chil- 
dren are  standing  at  their  mother's  knee ;  in  that  for  the 
second,  the  children  are  older,  and  are  bent  in  grief  over 

fthe  bier  of  their  dead  parents.  That  his  conception  of  a 
happy  universe  peopled  by  happy  children  does  not  square 
with  the  facts  of  daily  observation,  he  holds  to  be  due  to 
the  distortion  of  nature  by  man.  Had  man  been  content 
to  live  in  the  golden  age  of  innocence,  his  childlike  delight 
in  God  and  creation  would  not  have  been  perverted,  and  the 
Songs  of  Experience  would  not  have  been  necessary.  In 
The  Schoolboy,  the  child  who  sits  joyless  in  school,  "Worn 
thro'  with  the  dreary  shower,"  api)eals  to  its  i)arents  for 
freedom  to  live  naturally : 


270  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

O !  father  and  mother,  if  buds  are  nipped 
And  blossoms  blown  away, 
And  if  the  tender  plants  are  stripped 
Of  their  joy  in  the  springing  day, 
By  sorrow  and  care's  dismay. 

How  shall  the  summer  arise  in  joy, 

Or  the  summer  fruits  appear? 

Or  how  shall  we  gather  what  griefs  destroy. 

Or  bless  the  mellowing  year, 

When  blasts  of  winter  appear? 

In  Holy  Thursday  he  notes  the  humanitarian  motive  in 
relation  to  children  of  the  poor.  Is  it  a  holy  thing  to  see 
in  such  a  rich  and  fruitful  land  as  England 

Babes  reduced  to  misery, 

Fed  with  cold  and  usurous  hand? 

Had  man  not  interfered — ^perhaps  he  was  thinking  of  fields 
and  sky  blackened  with  industrial  smoke — children  might 
still  be  living,  as  he  had  pictured  them  in  Songs  of  Inno- 
cence, in  a  happy  state  of  nature. 

For  where'er  the  sun  does  shine, 
And  where'er  the  rain  does  fall. 
Babe  can  never  hunger  there, 
Nor  poverty  the  mind  appal. 

In  London  he  again  protests  against  man-made  restric- 
tions that  bind  the  child  : 

In  every  Infant's  cry  of  fear. 
In  every  voice,  in  every  ban, 
The   mind-forged   manacles   I    hear. 

In  his   Revolutionary   fervor,   Blake   has   extended    Pope's 

•  It      objections  to  school  discipline  to  include  restrictions  of  all 

"^'    r"  kinds.     As  in  Rousseau,  the  child  should  be  free  as  nature 

Imade  him:  man  must  not  interfere.     Blake  has  gone  far 


WILLIAM    IILAKE  271 

beyond  Pope  and  West  in  advocating  the  emancipation  of 
childhood.  The  advanced  position  of  P)lake  is  appreciated 
when  his  fiery  protests  are  compared  with  the  conservative 
suo^orestions  of  Cowper's  Tirocinium,  in  which  the  child  is 
brought  nearer  to  nature  by  removal  from  the  school  to  the 
home.  The  accents  of  Rousseau  are  unmistakable  only 
once  in  the  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Blake  alone 
in  poetry  ventured  as  far  as  the  French  philosopher.  At 
times  he  ventured  farther.  ^ 

The  humanitarian  motive  noticed  by  Ileadley  and 
Jerningham  is  fiercely  transmuted  by  unflinching  direct- 
ness of  phrasing,  which,  except  for  the  lyric  fire,  is  sug- 
gestive of  Crabbe : 

But  most  thro'  midnight  streets  I  hear 

How  the  youthful  harlot's  curse 

Blasts  the  new-born  infant's  tear, 

And  blights  with  plagues  the  marriage  hearse.  - 

The  war  motive  is  merged  with  the  protest  against 
luxury  in  the  "hapless  soldier's  sig'h"  which  ''Runs  in  blood 
down  palace  walls."  The  helpless  little  chimney-sweeper 
cries  out  against  spiritual  neglect,  which  Blake  shadows 
forth  in  the  image,  "every  black'ning  church."  In  fact, 
London  is  a  summation  of  most  of  the  themes  of  protest 
that  are  found  in  benevolist  poetry.  The  opening  stanza 
gives  Blake's  version  of  the  romantic  antipathy  toward  city 
life.  In  the  city,  all  is  restraint  and  repression,  and  man 
as  a  result  bears  the  marks  of  woe. 

^  Gnomic  Verses: 

The  Angel  that  presided  o'er  my  birth 

Said  'Little   creature,  framed  of  joy  and  mirth. 

Go,  love  without  the  help  of  anything  on  eartii.' 

-  Compare  the  MS.  variant :    "From  every  dismal  street  I  hear." 
This  is  nearer  Crabbe. 


272  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

I  wander  thro'  each  chartered  street, 

Near    where    the    chartered    Thames    does    flow, 

And  mark  in  every  face  I  meet 

Marks  of  weakness,  marks  of  woe. 

The  Chimney-Sweeper  is  important  because  it  reflects 
the  benevolist  doctrine  that  man  is  made  for  happiness 
in  this  world  and  that  his  happiness  should  therefore  not 
be  postponed  to  a  future  state.  Blake's  attitude  of  antagon- 
ism toward  the  church  as  one  of  the  institutions  that  hinder 
rather  than  help  the  child  to  happiness  is  clearly  revealed 
by  the  child'  itself.  The  humanitarian  protest  is  no  longer 
delivered  by  the  poet,  but  instead  he  has  one  of  those  chil- 
dren who  suffer  most  from  social  injustice  voice  the  cry 
against  neglect  of  children's  welfare: 

A  little  black  thing  among  the  snow. 
Crying  'weep !    'weep !    in   notes   of   woe ! 
'Where  are  thy  father  and  mother,  say?' — 
'They  are  both  gone  up  to  the  Church  to  pray. 

'Because  I  was  happy  upon  the  heath. 
And  smiled  among  the  winter's  snow, 
They  clothed  me  in  the  clothes  of  death. 
And  taught  me  to  sing  the  notes  of  woe. 

'And  because  I  am  happy  and  dance  and  sing. 
They   think  they   have    done    me    no    injury. 
And  are  gone  to  praise  God  and  His  Priest  and  King, 
Who  make  up  a  Heaven  of  our  misery.' 

These  lines  sbow  that  Blake  was  in  touch  with  the  most 
advanced  opinion  of  his  generation.  They  reflect  the 
opinions  voiced  in  the  Revolutionary  circles  of  Godwin 
and  Paine.  At  the  dinners  given  by  the  publisher  Johnson, 
Blake  met  Mary  WoUstonecraft,  Priestley,  Godwin,  Holcroft, 
and  Paine ;  and  he  seems  to  have  been  the  only  one  of  the 
group  who  dared  to  expose  to  the  public  gaze  his  extreme 
views  on  politics,   for  he   actually   wore   the  bonnet-rouge 


WILLIAM    m,.\KK  273 

on  the  street.  It  was  Rlakc  who  hiter  f^ave  Paine  the  time- 
ly warning  which  saved  his  friend  from  arrest.  lUake  was 
himself  tried  for  treason  at  Chichester  iij^on  the  accusation 
of  a  soldier  whom  Blake  believed  to  the  end  of  his  life  to 
be  an  agent  of  the  government.  To  take  Blake  out  of  his 
century,  and  to  treat  him  as  an  isolated  dreamer,  is,  there- 
fore, to  misunderstand  him.  Blake  was  a  "daring  specula- 
tor in  religion  and  morals  ...  he  was  and  always  con- 
tinued a  republican,  and  an  enemy  of  kings  and  war."  ^  He 
scorned  priestcraft  with  the  intensity  of  Shelley.  In  The 
Garden  of  Love  the  child  returns  to  the  green  on  which  he 
had  played,  and  there  he  finds  a  chapel  he  had  never  ob- 
served before.  Over  the  door  was  written  "Thou  shalt  not." 
And  when  he  turned  to  the  garden  of  love  that  had  always 
blossomed  with  flowers,  he  could  see  nothing  but  toml)- 
stones, 

And  priests   in   black  gowns   were   walking   their   rounds, 
And  binding  with  briars  my  joys  and  desires. 

■  It  was  contrary  to  Blake's  nature  to  have  the  child's  natural 
desires  fettered  and  bound. - 

1  William  Rossetti,    Prefatory  Memoir,   Aldine  Blake    (1800). 

2  Compare  Poems  from  the  Rossetti  MS:    JVhy  should  I  care 
for  the   men  of  Thames: 

Tho'   born   on   the   cheating   banks    of    Thames, 
Tho'  his  waters  bathed  my  infant  limbs. 
The   Ohio  shall   wash   his   stains   from   me : 
I  was  born  a  slave,  but  I  go  to  be  free  ! 

Compare  also  Langhorne's   The  Enlargement  of  the  Mind    (1763): 
Is  Nature,  all  benevolent,  to  blame 
That  half  her  offspring  are  their  mother's  shame? 
Did  she  ordain  o'er  this  fair  scene  of  things 
The  cruelty  of  priests  and  kings? 

Though   worlds   lie   murdered    for    their   wealth   or    fame. 
Is  Nature,  all  benevolent,  to  blame? 


274  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

In  A  Little  Boy  Lost  he  pictures  a  martyrdom  by  fire. 
A  priest  overhears  the  child  giving  expression  to  a  natural- 
istic sentiment.  The  child  is  voicing  the  thought  that  it 
is  not  possible  for  an  individual  to  know^  a  greater  than 
himself. 

'And,  Father,  how  can  I  love  you 

Or  any  of  my  brothers  more  ? 

I  love  you  like  the  little  bird 

That   picks    up    crumbs    around    the    door.' 

The  priest  (who  in  Blake's  naturalistic  conception  represents 
institutional  life  and  restraint  from  without)  was  horrified, 
and,  while  the  multitude  ''admired  the  priestly  care,"  ''led 
him  by  his  little  coat"  to  the  altar : 

*Lo !  what  a  fiend  is  here,'  said  he, 
'One    who    sets    reason    up    for    judge 
Of  our  mo»t  holy  Mystery,' 

In  place  of  proceeding  by  way  of  the  cold  reasonings  of 
his  friend  Godwin,  Blake  visualizes  the  situation  in  terms  of 
childhood. 

The  weeping  child  could  not  be  heard, 

The  weeping  parents  wept  in  vain; 

They  stripped   him   to   his   little   shirt, 

And  bound  him  in  an  iron  chain ; 

And  burned  him  in  a  holy  place, 
Where  many  had  been  burned  before : 
The  weeping  parents  wept  in  vain. 

Blake's  fiery  spirit  of  revolt  leads  him  to  break  in  with  the 
question. 

Are   such   things   done   on   Albion's   shore? 

Although  Blake  frankly  notices  effects  of  the  cleavage 
which  has  resulted  in  nature  from  man's  interference,  he  is 
not  led  to  disillusionment  in  the  Songs  of  Experience.  He 
states  the  cause  of  man's  unhappiness,  but  also  suggests  the 


WILLIAM    IJLAKE  275 

remedy.  Nature  and  God  are  not  at  fault.  In  The  Little 
Wigabond,  the  spiritual  neglect  of  the  church  is  arraigned 
in  the  simple  accents  of  a  child  who  naively  observes  the 
difference  between  the  bleak  church  and  the  warm  and 
inviting  alehouse. 

Dear  mother,  dear  mother,  the  Church  is  cold. 

But  the  Ale-house  is  healthy  and  pleasant  and  warm ; 

Besides  I  can  tell  where   I   am  used  well. 

The  church  had  long  been  out  of  touch  with  the  masses; 
by  the  middle  of  the  century  the  protests  against  the  tradi- 
tional curriculum  in  the  established  schools  included  amons: 
the  necessary  reforms,  that  of  closer  touch  between  priest 
and  congregation  in  intelligible  sermons.  Boswell  notes 
that  if  the  masses  are  to  be  reached,  it  will  be  necessary 
for  the  church  to  adopt  some  of  the  enthusiasm  of  the  dis- 
senters. The  child  in  Blake's  poem  has  noticed  that  parsons 
do  not  regale  people's  souls  with  attractive  fare  and  a 
"pleasant  fire."  Yet  if  the  church  were  properly  admin- 
istered, all  men  would  be  as  happy  as  birds  in  spring, 

And  God,  like  a  father,  rejoicing  to  see 

His  children  as  pleasant  and  happy  as  He, 

Would  have  no  more  quarrel  with  the  Devil  or  the  Barrel. 

Blake's  remedy  is  that  man  should  again  return  to 
nature ;  all  nature  is  given  him  if  he  will  but  open  his  heart. 
In  Earth's  Answer,  Earth,  who  hears  the  poet,  is  "covered 
with  gray  despair":  man  has  chained  himself  with  jealousies 
and  fears  and  selfishness ;  he  is  bound  by  his  senses  and 
conventions.     Earth  calls  in  despair : 

'Break  this  heavy   chain 

That  does  freeze  my  bones  around. 

Selfish !  vain ! 

Eternal  bane ! 

That   free   love  with   bondage   bound.' 


276  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Blake's  ''free  love"  is  the  spirit  of  love  that  permeates 
poetry  from  Thomson  to  Wordsworth.  But  in  his  protest 
against  restraining  forces,  he  was  probably  also  thinking 
more  specifically  of  the  Godwinian  attitude  toward  the  mar- 
riage bond.  ^  The  influence  of  Godwin  and  Revolutionary 
doctrines  did  not  in  this  respect  go  farther  than  theory  with 
Blake,  for  his  married  life  was  not  marred  by  acts  unbe- 
coming a  husband.  In  this  connection  it  is  interesting  to 
note  that  he  has  referred  in  London  to  the  "marriage 
hearse."  - 

The  dynamic  force  and  vivid  imagery  of  Songs  of  Ex- 
perience reveal  Blake's  violent  energy;  and  he  has  pushed 
famiHar  eighteenth-century  doctrines  to  daring  extremes. 
But  these  qualities  of  superior  genius  should  not  bHnd  the 
reader  to  the  identity  of  his  motives  with  those  of  his  pre- 
decessors. 

In  the  concentrated  force  of  his  epigrammatic  protest  in 
Auguries  of  Innocence  against  restraint  and  the  popular 
desire  to  make  the  child  over  into  something  which  he  is 
not  by  nature,  he  is  more  nearly  than  his  contemporaries  a 

1  "In  some  of  the  earlier  years  of  the  marriage,  indeed,  it  is 
said  that  grave  conflicts  of  feeling  and  of  will  arose  between  Blake 
and  his  wife — jealousy  on  her  part  being  the  essential  cause,  or 
rather  something  on  his  part  which  occasioned  her  jealousy.  This 
will  surprise  no  one  who  is  cognizant  of  the  full  range  of  Blake's 
writings,  and  who  consequently  knows,  that  his  views  of  the 
sexual  relation  and  of  the  marriage-tie  .  .  .  were  of  the  most 
audacious  possible  kind." — William  Rossetti,  Prefatory  Memoir, 
Aldine  Blake  (1890),  p.  xxii. 

2  Cp.   Gnomic   Verses. - 

Remove  away  that  black'ning  church. 
Remove  away  that  marriage  hearse. 
Remove  away  that  man  of  blood — 
You'll  quite  remove  the  ancient  curse. 


WILLIAM    BLAKK  277 

true  son  of  Rousseau  and  the  Revolution.  His  vehement 
denunciations  of  priestcraft  and  dogmas  that,  he  held,  do 
violence  to  child  nature,  often  recall  his  association  with 
the  Godwinian  circle,  and  suggest  also  the  fury  of  the  free- 
dom-loving Shelley.  All  other  poets  who  wrote  on  childhood 
in  England  before  and  during  the  time  of  Blake,  failed  t(j 
understand  or  at  least  to  apply  Rousseau's  dictum  that 
with  the  child  one  should  not  gain  time  but  lose  it,  by  which 
is  meant  the  policy  of  non-interference  with  natural  de- 
^velopment  of  children.  He  demands  freedom  for  the  child 
during  the  years  of  his  development.  Because  Blake  hated 
system  as  something  unnatural,  he  would  not  be  in  sympathy 
with  a  system  of  education  like  that  of  Madame  Genlis  or 
Sarah  Trimmer.  Teaching  of  all  kinds,  by  which  he  means 
interference  from  without  by  adults,  is  condemned.  He  is 
one  with  Rousseau  in  recognizing  that  the  adult  has  his 
place,  but  he  insists  that  the  child  has  his  inviolable  place 
also: 

He   who   respects  the   infant's   faith 
Triumphs  over  Hell  and  Death. 
The  child's  toys  and  the  old  man's  reasons 
Are  the   fruits  of   the   two   seasons. 

The  emmet's  inch  and  the  eagle's  mile  put  all  philosophy  of 
grow^n-ups  to  shame.  He  wdio  teaches  the  child  sophisti- 
cated lore  "the  rotting  grave  will  ne'er  get  out"  ;  and 

The  babe  that  weeps  the  rod  beneath 
Writes  revenge  in  realms  of  death. 

for  man  must  recognize  that  children  have  a  spiritual  na- 
ture, and  that  the  child,  therefore,  is  "more  than  swaddling- 
bands."  Because  of  man's  interference,  children  are  lx)rn 
only  "to  nig-ht,"  wdiich  is  l^lake's  way  of  saying  that  they 
are  system-bound  and  lacking  in  spiritual  insight.     If  man 


278  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

would  not  interpose  his  schemes,  children  would  be  born 
only  to  happiness.^ 

He  senses  eternity  in  the  soul  life  of  the  child  just  as 
clearly  as  he  sees  a  world  in  a  grain  of  sand — all  nature  is 
linked,  and  every  manifestation  of  nature  demands  the 
reverence  of  man  in  its  own  kind.  In  this  respect  Blake 
had  a  keen  vision  that  was  not  vouchsafed  to  writers  of 
moral  tales,  who  were  not  willing  to  take  the  child  for 
what  God  had  made  him.  Them  and  all  their  tribe  he  con- 
demns outright  as  unable  to  comprehend  child  nature ;  their 
efforts  are — and  here  again  he  is  in  harmony  with  Shaftes- 
bury and  Rousseau — a  mockery  of  God's  creation : 

He  who  mocks  the  infant's  faith 
Shall   be   mocked   in   Age   and   Death. 

j  In  Auguries  of  Innocence,  Blake  has  interwoven  with 
I  the  traditional  protest  against  restraint  a  true  understand- 
t^ing  and  respect  for  the  faculties  of  children.  In  so  far  as 
he  has  advanced  from  negative  protest  to  a  positive  vision, 
he  is  one  of  those  who,  beginning  with  the  liberalizing 
Shaftesbury,  lead  to  Herbart  in  pedagogy  and  Stevenson 
and  Field  in  poetry.  They  left  far  behind  them  the  traditional 
didactic  spirit  and  looked  upon  the  child  with  a  feeling 
heart  and  clear  understanding  that  were,  as  in  Blake,  in- 
spired by  respect  and  reverence  for  child  nature. 

In  Auguries  of  Innocence  Blake  delivers  his  message 
in  the  mood  of  the  benevolists.  References  to  animal  life 
clarify  and  enforce  the  thought  of  almost  every  epigram. 
The  Thomsonian  plea  for  freedom  is  condensed  by  Blake 
into  the  awe-inspiring  lines: 

1  Every  morn  and  every  night 
Some  are  born  to  sweet  delight. 
Some  are  born  to  sweet  delight, 
Some  are  born  to  endless  night 


WILLIAM    BLAKE  279 

A  robin  redbreast  in  a  cage 

Puts  all  heaven  in  a  rage. 

A  dove-house  filled  with  doves  and  pigeons 

Shudders  Hell  thro'  all  its  regions.  ^ 

Humanitarian  and  charitable  motives  are  treated  throuf^^h- 
out  in  the  same  mood,  and  always  with  a  terrible  intensitv 
and  ''double  vision." 

Each  outcry  of  the  hunted  hare 
A  fibre  from  the  brain  does  tear. 
A  skylark  wounded  in  the  wing, 
A  cherubim  does  cease  to  sing. 

* 

The  bat  that  flits  at  close  of  eve 
Has  left  the  brain  that  won't  believe. 
The  owl  that  calls  upon  the  night 
Speaks  the  unbeliever's  fright. 
He  who  shall  hurt  the  little  wren 
Shall  never  be  beloved  by  men. 
* 

The  wanton  boy   that  kills   the   fly 
Shall  feel  the  spider's  enmity. 
He  who  torments  the  chafer's  sprite 
Weaves  a  bower  in  endless  night. 
The   caterpillar   on   the   leaf 
Repeats  to  thee  thy  mother's  grief. 

The  inability  of  writers  of  moral  tales  to  take  the  child 
frankly  as  a  child,  and  to  reverence  him  without  interposing 
conceptions  foreign  to  child  nature,  is  illustrated  in  Poems 
on  Various  Subjects  for  the  Amusement  of  Youth,  the 
second  edition  of  which  was  published  in  the  same  year 
as  Songs  of  Innocence.  The  volume  is  pervaded  by  the 
conventional  humanitarianism  of  the  age.  The  ix^cms  lack 
the   spirit   of   Blake's  lyrics  because   they   were   written   at 

1  Cp.  Thomson's  lines  on  confined  and  caged  birds  in  Spring. 


280  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

children  in  a  spirit  of  bald  didacticism.  ^  Children  are 
plainly  lectured  instead  of  being  led  to  feel  the  situation. 
Blake,  on  the  other  hand,  in  place  of  acknowledging  a  line 
of  demarcation  between  the  child  and  the  natural  phenome- 
na of  animal  life,  identifies  the  child  spirit  with  that  of  the 
animal  by  a  perception  of  the  underlying  unity  that  binds 
all  creation.  The  child  and  animal  are  equally  conceived 
with  an  objectivity  that  forbids  the  recognition  of  a  line  of 
cleavage  between  created  beings. 

Blake  accepts  this  mystic  unity  as  a  fact,  and  does  not 
interpose  deductions  and  implications  that,  because  they  are 
the  result  of  mature  thought  based  on  reading  and  exper- 
ience, can  not  be  in  harmony  with  the  child's  thoughts  on 
the  subject.  The  pot-boilers  of  Charles  and  Mary  Lamb 
(however  delightful  as  compared  with  the  moral  tales  and 
their  congeners)  and  the  poems  of  Ann  and  Jane  Taylor 
fail  in  the  authors'  inability  to  enter  truly  into  the  child 
spirit.  The  poetry  of  the  Taylors,  delicate  as  the  verse 
often  is,  as  in  The  Violet,  and  Thank  Yoii,  Pretty  Cow,  and 
attractive  as  in  Tzvinkle.  twinkle  little  star,  nevertheless 
sufifers  because  they  do  not  interpret  the  impressions  of  a^ 

1  Nathaniel  Cotton  turned  to  childhood  in  Happiness: 
Go  to  the  schoolboy,  he  shall  preach 
What  twenty  winters  cannot  teach. 

His  didactic  purpose  is  clear  in  Slander: 

Childhood  and  youth  engage  my  pen. 
'Tis  labor  lost  to  talk  to  men. 

In  his  winning  lines  To  Some  Children  Listening  to  a  Lark  ("See 
the  lark  prunes  his  active  wings"),  he  asks, 

Shall   birds    instructive   lessons    teach, 
And  we  be  deaf  to  what  they  preach? 

No;  ye  dear  nestlings  of  my  heart! 
Go  act  the  wiser  songster's  part. 


WH.LIAM     ni.AKE  281 

[^child  in  tenns  of  child  thought  and  comprehension.  "So 
far  were  they  ruled  by  the  customary  requirement  of  their 
time,  that  they  falsely  endowed  the  juvenile  mind  with  the 
power  of  correlating  external  beauty  with  its  own  virtuous 
possibilities."  ^  Children  from  whom  the  sentiments  of 
these  poems  are  supix)sed  to  flow,  reveal  an  unnatural 
power  of  discrimination  that  is  not  childlike.  The  quick 
response  that  Blake's  So)igs  of  huioccnce  still  evoke  from 
children,  who  nonnally  consider  all  animals  and  flowers 
their  friends,  is,  again,  due  to  the  poet's  ability  and  willing- 
ness to  take  the  emotional  and  thought  life  of  the  child  for 
what  it  is,  and  to  reverence  it.  Blake  becomes  again  a  child, 
writing  as  a  child  would  if  he  had  the  power  of  poetic  ex- 
pression. 

This  intimate  unity  of  created  beings  is  expressed  almost 
exclusively  by  merging  the  animal  motive  with  the  child- 
hood theme.  By  bringing  these  two  elements  together  in 
the  development  of  universal  benevolence,  Thomson  had 
started  the  tradition  which  led  not  only  to  Bums's  natural 
magic  in  developing  childhood  themes  in  imagery  drawn 
from  bird  life,  but  also  to  Lovibond's  exaltation  of  the  child 
in  Rural  Sports.  Blake  is  the  recipient  of  the  same  in- 
fluences, and  it  is  only  by  understanding  the  attitude  of 
poets  during  the  eighteenth  century  toward  animals  that 
Blake's  lyrics  can  be  read  in  true  persp>ective.  Animals 
are  at  the  very  center  of  his  conception  of  life  as  expressed 
in  his  development  of  the  childhood  theme.  Lovilx)nd  had 
already  definitely  held  up  the  child  as  a  model  for  parents  ; 
and  Blake's  fundamentally  naturalistic  conception  in  Songs 
of  Innocence  is  in  hamiony  with  that  part  of  Christianity 
which  exalts  the  innocence  and  purity  of  the  child  heart : 

1  Children's  Books  and  Reading,  by  Montrose  J.   Moses,  New 
York,  1907. 


282  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

And  Jesus  called  a  little  child  unto  him,  and  set 
him  in  the  midst  of  them,  and  said,  Verily  I  say 
unto  you,  Except  ye  be  converted,  and  become  as 
little  children,  ye  shall  not  enter  the  kingdom 
of  Heaven. 

In  Blake's  conception,  children  are  in  complete  harmony 
with  the  spirit  of  benevolence  that  permeates  the  universe. 
Where  in  Sojtgs  of  Experience  and  Auguries  of  Innocence 
he  protests  against  man's  sense-bound  attitude,  in  the  pure 
conception  of  Songs  of  Innocence  he  depicts  childhood  as  it 
has  never  been  portrayed  again  in  English  literature. 
Children  enjoy  the  natural,  unquestioning  happiness  of 
which  man  might  partake  if  he  could  live  like  them  in 
conformity  with  nature.  The  ideal  state  of  happiness  in 
which  Blake's  children  live  and  move  spontaneously,  dif- 
ferentiates his  poems  from  those  of  other  poets.  His  im- 
ages embody  the  dream  of  the  eighteenth  century ;  his  ani- 
mals and  children  illustrate  the  vision  of  natural  goodness 
and  universal  benevolence.  Blake's  children  and  the  ani- 
mals with  which  they  live  in  community  of  feeling  and  in- 
terests are  not  those  of  this  world.  On  the  other  hand, 
Dora  Quillinan's  pet  lamb  is  an  animal  of  the  pastures  that 
every  Lancashire  peasant  knows.  Fidelity  tells  of  a  hound 
of  terrestrial  breed ;  and  one  always  thinks  of  the  poem  in 
connection  with  Sir  Walter  Scott's  Helvellyn,  Cowper's 
hare  and  Burns's  mouse  are  sentimentalized,  but  they  are 
nevertheless  of  the  type  known  from  experience.  In  the 
eighteenth  century  there  is  a  whole  catalogue  of  freakish 
beasts,  from  Shenstone's  playful  kid  that  gamboled  on  the 
roof  of  the  garden  house,  to  Lovibond's  farm-yard  gather- 
ing, Cowper's  Old  Tiny,  and  Wordsworth's  kitten  toying 
with  the  falling  leaves :  all  are  conceived  in  terms  of  com- 
mon experience.    But  Blake's  children  at  play  with  animals 


WILLIAM    IJLAKE  283 

represent  an  ideal  state  that  would  exist  if  natural  f^oodness 
and  instinctive  benevolence  were  facts. 

If  his  songs  have  an  Elizabethan  freshness,  it  is  because 
Blake  had  like  the  Elizabethans  an  eager,  childlike  enthu- 
siasm that  was  inspired  at  the  same  time  by  the  highest 
Christian  teachings  and  naturalistic  philosophy  with  regard 
to  the  child.  If  his  ballad-like  simplicity  has  greater  charm 
than  the  halting  verse  of  minor  eighteenth-century  poets, 
it  means  simply  that  he,  like  Burns,  added  lyric  power. 
His  lyrics  are  joyous  as  the  theme  he  develops,  because  he 
sang  with  an  Elizabethan  spontaneity  in  the  true  spirit  of 
ballad  simplicity.  The  Echoing  Green  is  of  the  eighteenth 
century  in  all  but  the  joyous  freshness  of  the  exhilarating 
lines  that  sing  themselves.  The  spontaneous  quality  of  the 
poem  must  not  obscure  the  fact  that  the  side  glance  to  bird 
life  is  not  new,  and  that  children  sporting  on  the  green 
have  been  observed  often  by  poets  before  Blake. 

The  Sun  does  arise. 

And  make  happy  the  skies ; 

The  merry  bells  ring 

To  welcome  the  Spring; 

The  skylark  and  thrush, 

The  birds  of  the  bush, 

Sing  louder  around 

To  the  bells'  cheerful  sound, 

While  our  sports  shall  be  seen 

On  the   Echoing  Green, 

The  image  of  old  folk  sitting  in  the  shade  and  recalling  the 
days  of  their  youth  is  not  new. 

Old  John,  with  white  hair, 
Does  laugh  away  care, 
Sitting  under  the  oak, 
Among  the  old  folk. 
They   laugh    at   our   play, 
And  soon  they  all  say: 


284  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

"Such,  such  were  the  joys 
When  we  all,  girls  and  boys. 
In  youth  time  were  seen 
On  the  Echoing  Green." 

The  image  at  the  heart  of  the  closing  stanza,  that  of  the 
mother  bird  and  her  brood,  is  not  novel. 

Till  the  little  ones,  weary, 
No  more  can  be  merry; 
The  sun  does  descend, 
And  our  sports  have  an  end. 
Round  the  laps  of  their  mothers 
Many  sisters  and  brothers. 
Like  birds  in  their  nest, 
Are  ready  for  rest, 
And  sport  no  more  seen 
On  the  darkening  Green. 

The  unaffected  abandon  to  the  child  spirit  is  new.  The 
play  of  children  is  that  of  natural  children,  and  not  sicklied 
over,  as  in  Gray,  by  thought  or  sentiment,  for  Blake  identi- 
fies himself  with  children  and  writes  as  from  the  heart  of  a 
child. 

In  The  Lamb,  he  has  again  written  wholly  from  the 
point  of  view  of  the  child  who  asks  the  little  lamb  if  it  knows 
its  maker. 

Little  Lamb,  who  made  thee? 
Dost  thou  know  who  made  thee? 

The  imagery  is  simple  and  convincing  because  it  is  con- 
ceived in  the  child  spirit.  lA  child's  observation  would  focus 
on  the  ''Softest  clothing,  woolly,  bright,"  and  on  the  "tender 
voice"  of  the  lamb.  |In  the  second  stanza  the  child  answers 
the  question  with  equal  simplicity,  but  with  a  mystic  insight 
into  the  unity  which  makes  lamb  and  child  one,  an  ob- 
servation that  is  at  the  same  time  profound,  and  yet  char- 


WILLIAM    I5LAKE  285 

acterized  by  just  that  simple  penetrative  power,  unspoiled 
by  experience,  that  is  associated  with  childhood. 

Little  Lamb,  I'll  tell  thee. 
Little  Lamb,  I'll  tell  thee: 
He  is  called  by  thy  name, 
For    He    calls    Himself   a    Lamb. 
He  is  meek,  and  He  is  mild; 
He  became  a   little   child. 
I  a  child,  and  thou  a  lamb, 
We  are  called  by  His  name. 

Blake  does  not  conceive  the  child  as  reasoning  out  the  j)rob- 
lem;  that  would  have  led  nowdiere,  and,  anyway,  would  not 
have  been  true  to  child  nature.  ^  The  child  feels  the  unity, 
and  states  it  like  a  child  as  a  fact,  directly  and  unquestion- 
ingly.  It  is  here  that  Blake  breaks  with  the  didactic  tra- 
dition. He  does  not  reason,  and  he  does  not  teach ;  instead 
he  sings  eternal  mystic  truths  in  the  lightsome  mood  of 
childhood,  before  doubt  has  awakened  the  mind  to  make  it 
gloomy.  Childhood  was  sacred  in  the  eyes  of  Blake  be- 
cause of  this  power,  which  is  lost  in  man. 

In  Night,  the  child's  thought  is  wholly  absorbed  in  im- 
ages from  animal  life.  He  is  not  thought  of  according  to 
one  standard,  and  birds  according  to  another.  He  unques- 
tioningly  accepts  his  life  as  guarded  by  the  same  benevo- 
lent spirit  which  protects  bird  and  beast.  So  delicately 
is   the   child   attuned   to   this   spirit   that   in   A    Dream   an 

1  Auguries  of  Innocence : 

The  questioner,  who  sits  so  sly. 
Shall  never  know  how  to  reply. 

* 

The  emmet's  inch  and  eagle's  mile 
Make  lame  Philosopliy  to  smile, 
lie  who  doubts  from  what  he  sees 
Will  ne'er  believe,  do  what  you  please. 


286  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

emmet  which  has  lost  its  way  casts  a  shadow  over  the 
"angel-guarded  bed"  of  a  child  asleep  on  the  grass.  In  a 
dream  the  child  heard  the  benighted  and  travel-worn  em- 
met say: 

*0,   my  children!   do  they   cry? 
Do   they   hear  their   father   sigh? 
Now  they  look  abroad  to  see : 
Now  return  and  weep  for  me.' 

The  child  pitied  the  emmet,  and  "dropped  a  tear."  But  he 
was  relieved  to  see  a  glow-worm,  who  replied  to  the  emmet, 

'What  wailing  wight 
Calls    the    watchman    of    the    night?' 

This  is  all  delightful.  The  story  has  a  happy  ending,  for  the 
glow-worm  sets  the  emmet  on  the  track  of  the  beetle. 

Any  child  would  joy  to  hear  his  mother  read  this  drama- 
tized episode  from  the  night  life  of  familiar  insects.  The 
animals  act  their  part  with  simple  dignity  and  restraint  that 
does  not  obscure  their  kindliness  of  heart.  Sensitive  na- 
tures had  responded  in  the  eighteenth  century  to  the  appeal 
for  a  consideration  of  the  rights  of  animals ;  but  Blake's 
vivid  imagination  carried  him  beyond  their  indignant  re- 
proaches and  sentimental  pleas  into  a  vital  dramatization  of 
animal  life  in  terms  of  the  humanitarian  spirit  that  had 
begun  to  pervade  all  classes  of  English  people  fifty  years 
before  the  emmet  and  glow-worm  conversed  in  the  grass 
near  a  sleeping  child.  In  the  sentiment  of  the  poem,  and  in 
the  ballad  form  which  harmonizes  perfectly  with  the  child 
spirit,  Blake  is  in  the  direct  line  of  Romantic  development 
that  led  to  the  simple  ballad  of  the  naturalistic  cottage  girl 
whose  inability  to  comprehend  the  sophisticated  poefs  in- 
sistence on  the  difference  between  life  and  death  emphasizes 
the  indestructible  unity  that  underlies  all  creation. 


WILLIAM    BLAKE  287 

There  is  a  touch  of  whimsicality  in  A  Dream  which 
foreshadows  definitely,  for  the  first  time  in  the  eii^hteentli 
century,  the  attitude  of  Stevenson  and  luifrene  Field. 
Children  spontaneously  rise  with  true  feelinp^  to  the  con- 
ceptien  of  the  emmet  who  has  lost  his  way  in  the  dark  and 
can  not  find  his  children.  It  is  inconceivable  that  Watts 
or  the  ultra-serious  Barbauld  and  Trimmer  should  have 
thought  in  terms  of  the  glow-worm  who  asks  what  wailing 
wight  calls  the  watchman,  or  still  less  of  the  injunction, 
which  suggests  the  whimsical  mood  of  Ji^yukoi,  Blyiikoi, 
and  Nod  , 

'I  am  set  to  light  the  ground. 
While  the  beetle  goes  his  round: 
Follow  now  the  beetle's  hum; 
Little  wanderer,  hie  thee  home.' 

In  this  poem  there  is  not  so  much  as  a  suggestion  of  teach- 
ing; in  fact,  the  child  is  not  made  to  feel  conscious  of  him- 
self at  all ;  his  sentiment  is  merged  with  a  situation  that 
is  perfectly  normal  to  his  conception  of  what  may  happen 
in  natural  life.  A  new  force  is  felt  here  in  children's 
poetry.  It  is  the  unaffected  and  untrammeled  working  of 
the  poet's  fancy.  Where  the  imaginative  approach  would 
be  too  strong  for  the  child's  comprehension,  the  fancy  of 
the  poet,  working  in  harmony  with  the  child's  mind  pro- 
cesses, conceives  a  situation  that  appeals  immcdiatelv  be- 
cause of  its  delicacy. 

On  Another's  Sorrow  shows  a  child  who  again  bears  wit- 
ness to  an  instinctive  universal  benevolence  that  had  been 
preached  without  Blake's  fire  by  poets  as  far  back  as  Thom- 
son. Blake's  child  can  not  conceive  of  a  state  in  which  he 
could  "see  a  falling  tear"  and  not  "seek  for  kind  relief." 
The  child  interprets  this  benevolent  spirit  first  in  terms  of 
the  domestic  life  with  which  he  is  familiar,  and  then  in 
terms  of  bird  life. 


288  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Can  a  father  see  his  child 
Weep,  nor  be  with  sorrow  filled? 
Can  a  mother  sit  and  hear 
An  infant  groan,  an  infant  fear? 

* 

And  can  He  who  smiles  on  all 
Hear  the  wren  with  sorrows  small, 
Hear  the  small  bird's  grief  and  care, 
Hear  the  woes  the  infants  bear, 

And  not  sit  beside  the  nest, 
Pouring  pity  in  their  breast; 
And  not  sit  the  cradle  near, 
Weeping  tear  on  infant's  tear; 
* 

He  doth  give  His  joy  to  all; 
He  becomes  an  infant  small. 

Here  the  conception  is  closer  to  Christianity,  and  there  is 
also  a  faint  suggestion  of  teaching  the  child,  although  the 
child  is  speaking. 

In  Songs  of  Innocence  the  opposites  of  those  poems 
which  treat  the  same  subjects  in  a  mood  of  protest  in  Songs 
of  Experience  are  pervaded  by  the  spirit  of  benevolence. 
In  these  the  poet  is  closer  to  the  outward  events  of  life. 
Holy  Thursday  is  one  of  the  group  which  reflect  actual  ex- 
perience, or  at  least  approach  it.  It  is  connected  with  that 
century-old  institution,  the  annual  charity  sermon,  which 
was  preached  on  a  stated  day,  and  which  charity  children 
attended  in  a  body.  They  were  garbed  in  the  distinctive 
dress  of  their  schools,  each  group  distinguished  by  a  certain 
color.  ^  Holy  Thursday  is  one  of  the  earliest  of  the  group, 
the  first  draft  being  included  in  the  manuscript  known  as 

1  Compare   the   dress   of  Lamb  and    Coleridge  while   pupils   at 
Christ's  Hospital. 


WILLIAM    lU.AKE  289 

An  Island  in  the  Moon}  The  background  associates  the 
poem  with  St.  Paul's  in  London.  Blake  has  developed  the 
charity  motive  more  vividly  than  Thomson,  who  had  also 
noticed  the  happy  songs  of  institutional  children.  Blake 
pleads  with  men  not  to  look  unsympathetically  upon  this 
throng  of  innocent  children,  and  has  enriched  the  poem  by 
images  from  nature.  The  deep  love  and  humanity  which 
pervade  the  poignant  lines  in  The  Little  Blaek  Boy  are  here 
also  appealingly  phrased  in  connection  with  the  multitudes 
of  children  who  enter  St.  Paul's. 

'Twas  on  a  Holy  Thursday,  their  innocent  faces  clean. 
The  children  walking  two  and  two,  in  red  and  blue  and  green, 
Grey-headed  beadles  walked  before,  with  wands  as  white  as  snow, 
Till  into  the  high  dome  of  Paul's  they  like  Thames'  waters  flow. 

O  what  a  multitude  they  seemed,  these  flowers  of  London  town! 
Seated  in  companies  they  sit  with  radiance  all  their  own. 
The  hum  of  multitudes  was  there,  but  multitudes  of  lambs, 
Thousands    of    little    boys    and    girls    raising    their    innocent    hands. 

Now  like  a  mighty  wind  they  raise  to   Heaven  the   voice  of  song. 
Or  like  harmonious  thunderings  the  seats  of  Heaven  among. 
Beneath  them  sit  the  aged  men,  wise  guardians  of  the  poor; 
Then  cherish  pity,  lest  you  drive  an  angel  from  your  door. 

The  poem  reveals  Blake's  ability  to  take  a  subject  from 
common  life  and  to  depict  it  in  lines  that  are  definite  and 
concrete.  He  has  localized  his  subject  and  given  it  firmer 
outlines  than  can  be  found  in  the  most  typical  Songs  of 
Innocence.  In  this  near  approach  to  physical  reality  he 
lias  not  refrained  from  applying  the  moral  in  the  last  line. 
The  sorrows  of  the  little  chimney-sweepers  are  con- 
ceived sentimentally  by  depicting  the  pathetic  joy  which  the 
misused  creatures  draw  from  a  mere  dream.     It  is  not  ac- 

1  Mr.  John  Sampson,  op.  cit.,  page  liv  :  "1784  circa,  Writes  An 
Island  in  the  Moon,  containing  earliest  of  Songs  of  Innocence." 


290  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

cidental  that  Blake  was  drawn  to  these  children  of  soot 
and  smoke.  It  is  an  historical  fact  that  these  boys  often 
had  a  fire  lighted  under  them  to  force  them  to  climb  into  a 
chimney  which  they  feared.^  Blake  does  not  intrude 
sophisticated  notions  of  grown-ups,  except  possibly  in 
the  last  line,  but  allows  the  child,  in  his  own  simple  lan- 
guage, to  arouse  humanitarian  sympathy  without  a  direct 
appeal  for  it.  Like  Southey  fifteen  years  later  in  The  Battle 
of  Blenheim,  Blake  has  written  in  the  main  with  artistic  de- 
tachment and  objectivity  that  make  a  powerful  appeal  be- 
cause the  terrible  conditions  which  worked  injustice  on  help- 
less children  are  imaginatively  realized.  His  phrasing  of 
the  pathetic  ray  of  hope  for  happiness  in  their  work  is  more 
convincing  than  many  lines  of  moralizing  or  preachment. 

When  my  mother  died  I  was  very  young, 
And  my  father  sold  me  w^hile  yet  my  tongue 
Could  scarcely  cry  "  'weep  !   'weep  !  'weep  !  'weep !" 
So  your  chimneys  I  sweep,  and  in  soot  I  sleep. 

There's  little  Tom  Dacre,  who  cried  when  his  head, 
That  curled  like  a  lamb's  back,  was  shaved :  so  I  said 
"Hush,  Tom!  never  mind  it,  for  when  your  head's  bare 
You  know  that  the   soot  cannot  spoil  your  white  hair." 

And  so  he  was  quiet,  and  that  very  night, 

As  Tom  was  a-sleeping,  he  had  such  a  sight! — 

That  thousands  of  sweepers,   Dick,  Joe,   Ned,   and  Jack, 

Were  all  of  them  locked  up  in  coffins  of  black. 

And  by  came  an  Angel  who  had  a  bright  key. 
And  he  opened  the  coffins  and  set  them  all  free; 
Then  down  a  green  plain  leaping,  laughing,  they  run. 
And  wash  in  a  river,  and  shine  in  the  sun. 

1  "drove  him  up  the  chimney  with  blows,  pin  proddings,  and 
even  with  the  lighting  of  a  fire  beneath  his  feet."  O.  Jocelyn  Dun- 
lop:  English  Apprenticeship  and  Child  Labour,  p.  271,  1912,  London. 


WILLIAM    HLAKE  291 

Then  naked  and  white,  all  their  bags  left  behind, 
They  rise  upon  clouds  and  sport  in  the  wind; 
And  the  Angel  told  Tom,  if  he'd  be  a  good  boy, 
He'd  have  God  for  his  father,  and  never  want  joy. 

And  so  Tom  awoke;  and  we  rose  in  the  dark. 
And  got  with  our  bags  and  our  brushes  to  work. 
Tho'  the  morning  was  cold,  Tom  was  happy  and  warm; 
So  if  all  do  their  duty  they  need  not  fear  harm. 

In  Sojigs  of  Experience  and  Auguries  of  Innocence, 
Blake  is  in  the  direct  line  of  development  from  Shaftesbtiry 
and  Thomson,  and,  moreover,  shows  the  more  daring  phras- 
ings  of  the  Revoltitionary  period  in  which  he  lived.  Except 
for  the  group  of  poems  in  which  he  is  close  to  grimly  real 
suflfering  and  misfortune  that  are  developed  in  their  hu- 
manitarian aspects,  so  that  he  is  tempted  like  the  moral 
writers  to  stiggest  a  moral  for  the  benefit  of  children.  Songs 
of  Innocence  reveals  the  purest  form  of  the  poets'  dream  of 
a  happy  state  of  childhood.  More  successfully  than  other 
poets  of  the  century  he  has  refrained  from  moralizing 
childhood. 

After  all,  the  true  secret  of  Blake's  success  lies  in  his 
reverence  forrhilfjhood  in  all  its  manifestations.  ^  He  did 
iiuL  klltiel  before  it  in  the  same  sense  as  Wordsworth,  who 
deified  the  child  by  imaginatively  exalting  it  in  the  Ode, 
Neither  did  Blake  look  upon  the  child  in  the  spirit  of 
Eugene  Field's  Little  Boy  Blue,  where  the  i)arents  behold 
in  the  rusty  tin  soldiers,  standing  in  the  array  in  which  their 
child  left  them,  an  altar  at  which  to  worship  the  mystery 

1  Langhorne's    Enlargement    of    the    Mind    (Epistle    II,    1765) 
answers  the  question, 

But   why  should   life,   so  short  by   Heaven  ordained, 
Be    long    to    thoughtless    infancy    restrained   ,    .    .    ? 

* 

O  blind  to  truth!  to  Nature's  wisdom  blind! 


292  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

of  life.  With  Blake  it  is  the  frank  acceptance  and  faithful 
realization  of  the  child's  sense  of  wonder  and  mystery,  in 
such  poems  as  The  Little  Girl  Lost  and  The  Little  Girl 
Found  (Songs  of  Experience),  that  causes  children  to  rec- 
ognize in  their  elders  a  community  of  feeling  which  breeds 
a  quick  response  because  of  equality  and  identity  of  interest. 
Blake's  child  spirit  is  revealed  better  than  anywhere  else  in 
that  mystical  sense  which  in  less  simple  and  human  form 
dominated  and  motivated  his  later  work  not  connected  with 
childhood.  His  elemental  frankness  and  true  ballad  ob- 
jectivity made  it  possible  for  him  to  feel  and  write  like  one 
of  his  poetic  children.  The  sentiment  of  Blake  never  be- 
comes sentimental  or  forced,  for  the  reason  that  it  is  char- 
acterized by  true  simplicity  of  child  sentiment.  Like  the 
nurse  in  Nurse's  Song,  he  is  one  of  the  group.  There  is 
no  herding  into  the  fold  as  in  Dorothy  Wordsworth's  poem ; 
instead  it  is  ''let  us  away."     The  children  answer, 

"No,  no,  let  us  play,  for  it  is  yet  day, 
And  we  cannot  go  to  sleep ; 
Besides,  in  the  sky  the  little  birds  fly, 
And  the  hills  are  all  covered  with  sheep." 

Then  follows  a  spontaneous  acquiescence,  for  children  must 
not  be  thwarted  in  their  natural  desires : 

"Well,  well,  go  and  play  till  the  light  fades  away, 
And  then  go  home  to  bed." 

The  little  ones  leaped  and  shouted  and  laughed 
And  all  the  hills  echoed. 

At  last,  then,  in  spite  of  tradition  that  would  place  fet- 
ters on  children,  in  place  of  brimstone-and-fire  threats,  and 
in  the  face  of  moral  strictures  and  forbiddings,  the  child  is 
free  and  can  sing  in  the  Laughing  Song, 


WILLIAM    HLAKE  293 

When  the  green  woods  laugh  with  the  voice  of  joy. 
And  the  dimpHng  stream  runs  laughing  by; 
When  the  air  does  laugh  with  our  merry  wit. 
And  the  green  hill  laughs  with  the  noise  of  it; 

When  the  meadows  laugh  with  lively  green, 

And  the  grasshopper  laughs  in  the  merry  scene, 

When  Mary  and  Susan  and  Emily 

With  their  sweet  round  mouths  sing,  "Ha,  Ha,  He!" 

When  painted  birds  laugh   in   the  shade. 

When   our   table   with    cherries   and    nuts    is    spread, 

Come  live,  and  be  merry,   and  join  with  me. 

To  sing  the  sweet  chorus  of  "Ha,  Ha,  He !" 

Blake's  achievement  of  placing  the  child  on  a  plane  where 
his  desires  and  impulses  are  recognized  as  facts  to  be  un- 
hesitatingly accepted  in  place  of  being  repressed  or  made 
over  into  something  else,  entitles  him  to  the  i>osition  of 
pioneer  poet  in  the  modern  sense  of  poetry  about  children, 
where  the  ideal  is  that  oneness  with  nature  is  the  "glory 
of  Childhood". 

The  Christian  terminology  which  Blake  took  over  in 
his  poems  is  not  out  of  harmony  with  his  essentially  natural- 
istic conception  of  childhood.  Unless  he  had  coined  an  en- 
tirely new  vocabulary,  which  would  have  militated  against 
clearness,  as  it  does  where  he  has  invented  fantastic  phrases 
in  his  later  poems,  ^  he  could  not  well  avoid  using  such  terms 
as  "Shepherd,"  "Lamb,"  "God,"  "Angel,"  "Heaven." 
"Father,"  "Maker,"  which  were  ready  at  hand,  but  to  which 
he  did  not  always  attach  the  traditional  theological  concep- 
tions. Blake's  children  speak  of  their  maker  as  of  a  friend. 
There  is  no  suggestion  in  the  child  lyrics  of  an  external 
God ;  they  are  not  conscious  of  an  anthropomorphic,  absolute 

1  Compare  "Oothoon,"  "Golgonooza,"  "Bowlahoola,"  "Ololon." 


294  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

monarch  who  rules  heaven  and  earth  as  in  the  Miltonic 
conception ;  there  is  no  supernatural  being  whom  they  must 
fear  as  in  the  economy  of  Watts.  When  Blake's  intention 
is  most  evident,  as  in  The  Shepherd,  the  child  interprets  his 
observations  without  being  disturbed  by  the  thought  of 
anything  but  the  shepherd  in  the  fields  with  his  ewes  and 
lambs.  In  The  Lamb  the  child  in  the  same  mood  spon- 
taneously identifies  himself  with  animals,  who  are 
then  at  once  identified  with  God.  Far  from  being  blas- 
phemy, this  is  in  the  naturalistic  conception  the  highest  com- 
pliment the  child  is  capable  of  paying  its  maker.  The  sense 
of  fellowship,  and  the  untutored  acceptance  of  God  as  one  of 
its  own  kind,  which  are  expressed  in  all  of  the  child's  songs 
with  unaffected  naturalness  that  suggests  no  outside  inter- 
ference, are  signs  of  inborn  reverence.  According  to  the 
naturalistic  view,  the  greatest  token  of  respect  is  the  child's 
acceptance  of  its  elders  as  equals. 

In  The  Voice  of  the  Devil,  Blake  outlines  his  conviction 
that  all  bibles  and  sacred  codes  have  been  the  cause  of  the 
erroneous  belief  that  man  has  "two  real  existing  principles, 
viz.,  a  Body  and  a  Soul,"  and  that  ''Energy,  called  Evil,  is 
alone  from  the  Body,"  and  that  "God  will  torment  Man  in 
Eternity  for  following  his  Energies."  Blake  holds  the 
following  contraries  to  be  true ;  "that  man  has  no  Body 
distinct  from  his  Soul ;  for  that  called  Body  is  a  portion  of 
Soul  discerned  by  the  five  Senses,  the  chief  inlets  of  Soul," 
and  that  "Energy  is  the  only  life,  and  is  from  the  Body 
.  .  .  Energy  is  Eternal  Delight."  There  is  nothing 
devilish,  therefore,  in  following  natural  energy  and  desire. 
Blake  condemns  Milton,  for  instance,  for  fettering  his 
angels  and  giving  liberty  of  action  to  devils.  The  truer 
conception  would  have  been,  in  his  estimation,  to  recognize 


WILLIAM    HLAKE  295 

natural  desire,  which  can  be  restrained  and  made  passive 
only  in  those  who  are  weak  enough  to  be  restrained  ;  but  to 
be  weak  is  to  be  witliout  energy;  that  is.  without  life. 
When  Blake  wished  to  reawaken  men  to  his  belief,  he  held 
up  the  child.  Although  he  recognizes  the  disturbing  in- 
fluence of  man  in  Songs  of  Experience,  he  had  written  into 
the  Songs  of  Innocence  his  vision  of  tlie  unrestrained  phy- 
sical delight  of  innocent  children,  who  manifest  a  soul  life 
unspoiled  and  not  made  self-conscious  by  institutit^nal  inter- 
ference. ^ 

Blake's  historical  position  near  the  close  of  a  develop- 
ment that  had  taken  place  for  nearly  three  quarters  of  a 
century  made  it  possible  for  his  exuberant  spirit  to  find  a 
positive  outlet  after  the  ground  had  been  cleared  by  poets 
during  the  decades  before  1789.  In  place  of  talking  alx)ut 
the  child  or  to  it,  Blake  is  at  one  with  the  child.  ''Blake 
carried  himself  back  into  the  days  of  childhood,  when  all 
was  joy  and  innocence,  and  when  the  new-born  soul  felt 
no  other  emotions  but  life  and  the  joy  of  living."-     If  man 

1  Compare  Motto  to  the  Songs  of  Innocence  and  of  Experience: 

The  Good  are  attracted  by  men's  perceptions, 

And  think  not  for  themselves ; 

Till  Experience  teaches  them  to  catch 

And  to  cage  the  fairies  and  ehes. 

{Rossetti  MS.) 

Compare  also  Infant  Sorrozi': 

I  beheld  the  Priest  by  day, 
Where  beneath  my  vines  he  lay, 
Like  a  serpent  in  the  day 
Underneath  my  vines  he  lay. 

(Rossetti  MS.) 

2  William  Blake,  Poet  and  Mystic,  by  P.  Bcrgcr.  translated  by 
Daniel  H.  Conner,  Chapman  and  Hall,  London,  1914,  p.  286. 


296  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

would  but  be  natural,  his  happiness  would  be  as  unques- 
tioning as  that  of  the  child  in  Infant  Joy: 

"I  have  no  name : 

I  am  but  two  days  old." 

What  shall  I  call  thee? 

"I  happy  am, 

Joy  is  my  name." 

Sweet  joy  befall  thee! 

Pretty  Joy! 

Sweet  Joy,  but  two  days  old. 

Sweet  Joy  I  call  thee: 

Thou  dost  smile, 

I  sing  the  while. 

Sweet  joy  befall  thee ! 

This  is  pagan  in  its  headlong  abandon  to  the  joy  of 
living.  For  the  ideal  of  the  institutional  child  the  poet  has 
substituted  the  naturalistic  delights  of  a  child  who  in  na- 
tural goodness  has  inherited  happiness  because  he  is  living 
unquestioningly  in  harmony  with  the  spirit  of  love  that 
would  visibly  pervade  the  world  if  man  did  not  interfere."^ 
Blake  had  the  fullest  vision  of  universal  benevolence  that 
wishes  happiness  for  all  men;  but  to  be  happy  they  must 
be  again  like  children — innocent,  gladsome,  and  acknow- 
ledge no  restraint  from  without. 

Professor  Irving  Babbitt  may  inveigh  against  the  evils 
which  he  sees  growing  out  of  such  a  naturalistic  abandon 
to  the  god  Whirl  as  Blake  has  reflected  in  Infant  Joy, 
Laughing  Song,  and  Spring.  However,  those  forces  of 
benevolence  which  had  been  at  work  since  Shaftesbury, 
and  which  had  gradually  modified  the  attitude  of  poets 
toward  children,  reached  in  Blake's  Songs  of  Innocence 
their  highest  literary  expression  in  the  exaltation  of  mani- 


WILLIAM    HLAKE  297 

festations  of  instinctive  "goodness  and  universal  benevolence 
which  recognize  fellowship  with  animals.  In  his  protest 
against  what  he  considered  unjust  outside  control,  from 
which  children  had  for  ages  suffered  at  the  hands  of  man, 
Blake  could  hardly  have  depicted  the  naturalistic  concep- 
tion more  unqualifiedly  than  in  Spring.  The  effusiveness  of 
the  child  in  this  poem  shows  the  extreme  recoil  from  the 
decorum  of  the  institutional  ideal. 

Little  boy. 
Full  of  joy; 
Little  girl. 
Sweet  and  small ; 
Cock  does  crow, 
So  do  you; 
Merry  voice. 
Infant  noise, 
Merrily,    merrily,   to   welcome    in    the  year. 

Little  Iamb, 
Here  I  am; 
Come  and  lick 
My  white  neck; 
Let  me  pull 
Your  soft  wool  ;* 
Let  me  kiss 
Your  soft  face : 
Merrily,  merrily,   we  welcome   in   the   year. 

This  is  a  romantic  child.  If  energy,  as  Blake  held,  is 
the  manifestation  of  soul,  this  child  is  richly  endowed.  Un- 
like the  type  he  supersedes,  Blake's  child,  it  is  obvious,  has 
great  capacity  for  feeling,  but  not  for  thought,  because  no 
restraining  forces  are  recognized.  Judgment  is  romanti- 
cally subordinated  to  feeling,  which  is  held  to  be  naturally 
good.     Certainly,  Blake's  child  in  Spring  has  no  inklings  of 


298  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

the  restrictive  conscience  for  which  Shaftesbury  substituted 
expansive  emotion.  Spontaneity  is  completely  realized. 
Beyond  this  the  poets  who  follow  Shaftesbury  can  not  go  in 
their  portrayal  of  children  who  wholeheartedly  respond  to 
impulses.  The  child  is  no  longer  a  rational  being,  but  a 
spontaneous  creature  that  impulsively  follows  natural  in- 
stincts. 


[ 


CHAPTER  VII 
WILLIAM  WORDSWORTH 


More  than  anv  otlier  eminent  Enoiish  man  of  letters, 
Wordsworth  is  the,  poet  of  childhood.  His  poetry  depicts 
tlie  moods  and  activities  of  children  more  extensively  than 
verse  prior  to  his.  His  heart  was  attuned  to  childhood  in 
all  its  manrfestations.  Yet  he  did  not  write  for  children^* 
Wordsworth's  classification  of  his  poems,  mystifying  in 
other  respects,  indicates  clearly  that  he  did  not  attempt  a 
body  of  verse  for  children.  Nevertheless,  with  aflfectionate 
and  loving  attention  to  detail  he  has  noticed  them  from 
nursery  days  to  school  time.  His  poems  contain  a  gallery 
of  individual  portraits,  especially  of  subjects  from  the 
humbler  walks  of  life,  in  London  as  well  as  in  the  Lake 
District  and  the  southwestern  counties  of  England. 

Although  Wordsworth  extended  the  boundaries  of  poet- 
ry to  include  all  phases  of  childhood,  his  treatment  is  in 
harmony  with  that  of  poets  from  Prior  to  Crabbe.  His 
poetry,  with  that  of  Blake,  represents  the  fine  flowering  of 
the  eighteenth-century  attitude  toward  childhood.  ^  There" 
are,  for  instance,  manifest  suggestions  of  harmony^between 
his  lines  on  native  fields  and  those  that  have  been  noted  from 
Akenside  to  Southey.  Sometimes,  also,  he  echoes  the  very 
words  of  eighteenth-century  poets,  as  in  the  third  book  of 
The  Prelude,  where  his  lines  on  the  habits  of  youths  at  Cam- 
bridge University  recall  Tickell's  passage  on  student  life  at 
Oxford, 

^  Until  a  careful  study  of  Wordsworth's  sources  has  been 
made  in  the  light  of  eighteenth-century  influences,  his  poetic  method 
can  not  be  fully  understood. 


300  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

■\Vhere  the  Black  Edward  passed  his  beardless  3'outh.  i 

Although  Blake  and  Wordsworth  alike  felt  the  strong 
urge  of  influences  at  work  in  the  eighteenth  century,  there  is 
between  them  a  difference  of  emphasis  in  the  treatment  of 
childhood.  Both  poets  are  fervent  and  warm  in  conception 
and  expression.  Yet,  except  possibly  for  a  poem  like  the 
Ode,  the  body  of  Wordsworth's  poetry  about  childhood  re- 
veals a  saner  treatment.  Wordsworth  remarked  of  the 
Songs  of  Innocence  and  Songs  of  Experience:  ''There  is 
something  in  the  madness  of  this  man  which  interests  me 
more  than  the  sanity  of  Lord  Byron  and  Walter  Scott." 
Nevertheless,  Wordsworth  held  closer  than  Blake  to  com- 

1  Thomas  Tickell's   on   Queen  Caroline's  rebuilding   the   lodg- 
ings of  the  Black  Prince  and  Henry  V.  at  Queen's  College,  Oxford: 

In  that  coarse  age  were  princes  fond  to  dwell 

With  meagre  monks,  and  haunt  the  silent  cell. 

Sent  from  the  Monarch's  to  the  Muses'  court, 

Their  meals  were  frugal,  and  their  sleeps  were  short ; 

To  couch  at  curfew  time  they  thought  no  scorn. 

And  froze  at  matins  every  winter  morn ; 

They  read  on  early  book  the  starry  frame, 

And  lisped  each  constellation  by  its  name ; 

Art  after  art  still  dawning  to  their  view, 

And  their  mind  opening  as  their  stature  grew. 

In  addressing  his  alma  mater,  Wordsworth  contrasts  the  luxury- 
loving  youths  of  his  day  with  the  abstemious  "nurslings"  who  sub- 
mitted to  academic  discipline  "from  their  first  childhood," 

When,  in  forlorn  and  naked  chambers  cooped 

And  crowded,  o'er  the  ponderous   books  they   hung 

Like  caterpillars  eating  out  their  way 

In  silence,  or  with  keen  devouring  noise 

Not  to  be  tracked  or  fathered.      Princes  then 

At  matins  froze,  and  couched  at  curfew-time, 

Trained  up  through  piety  and  zeal  to  prize 

Spare  diet,  patient  labour,  and  plain  weeds. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  301 

mon  experience ;  the  reader  feels  that  he  is  in  the  presence 
of  real  children.  The  difference  is  due,  in  part  at  least,  to 
poetic  method.  Wordsworth  preferred  to  write,  not  like 
the  earlier  master  during  the  spontaneous  overflow  of  emo- 
tion, but  in  his  favorite  tranquil  mood  of  recollected  emotion. 
Unlike  Blake,  and  much  more  like  Sir  Walter  Scott,  though 
in  a  different  mood,  he  loved  to  localize  his  affections.  His 
geographical  sense,  which  led  to  the  choice  of  definite  back- 
grounds in  most  instances,  kept  him  in  the  company  of  chil- 
dren of  flesh  and  blood. 

His  deep  sense  of  moral  responsibility  served  to  em- 
phasize this  trait  of  stern  fidelity  to  outward  fact.  Blake's 
preternaturally  bright  and  vivid  backgrounds  can  seldom  be 
localized.  lUake  asked  for  his  visions  of  delight  no  merely 
terrestrial    location.     In    Wordsworth,    however,    the    geo- 

(graphy  of  the  background  against  which  he  observed  chil- 
dren is  as  a  rule  clear  and  definite.  Blake's  Echoing  Green 
will  never  be  identified,  because  it  incorporates  the  essential 
delights  of  children  at  play  on  any  English  village  green. 
To  localize  it,  as  one  loves  to  do  with  Wordworth's  poems, 
would  be  out  of  keeping  with  Blake's  vision  of  universal  de- 
light for  children  at  play  out  of  doors.  In  The  Prelude. 
Wordsworth  individualizes  and  identifies  the  Bowling  Green 
on  the  hillside  al)ove  Lake  Windermere,  because  his  vision 
of  happiness  and  contentment  is  affectionately,  associated 
with  specific  localities.  ^His.JgcaJ__f£eliniC._is_.  strong.  His 
mood((lemands,  like  Michael's  at  the  unfinished  sheep-fold, 
an  object  in  nature  with  which  to  associate  emotional  ex- 
perience.*) Wordsworth  is  seldom  concerned  merely  with 
airy  fancies ;  he  usually  gives  them  a  local  habitation  and 
a  name.  He  gains  in  realism  because  he  conveys  the  im- 
pression of  writing  with  his  eye  on  the  individual  child 
and  his  experiences. 


302  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

]  Like  Blake,  Wordsworth  found  in  the  child  unspoiled 
by  rnan  the  inn'^f  satisfying-  il1ustratimi__of_me  sim|)leHfe7 
*lTe  too  would  rejuvenate  society  by  way  of  the  child.  But 
less  radical  than  Blake,  he  did  not  wish  to  do  away  with 
institutions  that  militate  against  happiness,  but  instead  to 
reform  them  by  modifications  which  he  considered  practi- 
cal. His  expressed  wish  to  be  considered  as  a  teacher  or  as 
nothing,  prompted  him  to  write  expository  passages  on  the 
need  of  reform.  As  a  result  the  humanitarian  and  ethical 
aspects  are  more  obvious  than  in  Blake.  Wordsworth's 
preoccupation  with  childhood  led  him  not  only  to  a  state- 
ment of  moods  which  are  the  essence  of  universal  child- 
hood, as  in  the  Ode,  or  IV c  Are  Seven,  but  also  to  a  con- 
:  sideration  of  the  practical  problems  of  education,  as  in  The 
I  Prelude,  and  the  reform  of  industrial  abuses,  as  in  The 
Excursion. 

I 

I  The  extent  and  depth  of  his  interest  in  the  varying 
manifestations  of  childhood  are  reflected  in  his  notice  of 
thildren  under  many  circumstances  and  moods  from  birth 
to  death,  in  the  home  or  near  it,  in  the  fields  and  beside 
streams,  in  school  or  on  the  way  to  and  from  it.  Unlike 
his  predecessors,  he  observes  children  with  equal  variety 
and  interest  in  the  city  as  well  as  in  the  country.-  It  is 
true  that  his  somewhat  rigid  nature  could  not  unbend  suffi- 
ciently to  make  him  the  care-free  companion  of  children — 
in  the  Anecdote  for  Fathers  he  appears  awkward  and  ex- 
ternal— ^but  he  nevertheless  reveals  a  consistent  deep  in- 
\  terest  in  them,  and  certainly  never  fails  to  notice  them.  Al- 
i  though  he  could  not  sport  with  them,  he  evinces  an  affection 
that  prompted  and  lay  at  the  heart  of  his  philosophy  of  life, 
and  conditioned  his  poetic  expression  of  it.  If  he  was  not 
able  to  aoandon  himself  to  them  in  their  lightsome  moods. 


V 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  303 

he  yet  honored  the  man  who  Hke  the  Wanderer  in  The  Ex- 
cursion loved  to  have  children  about  him : 

The  rough  sports 
And  teasing  wavs  of  children  vexed  not  him. 

(I,  415-416). 
Michael  tells  his  son  that  they  had  been  playmates  among 
the  hills,  so  that  Luke  did  not 

Lack  any  pleasure  which  a  boy  can  know. 
When  W^ordsworth  expressed  the  anxiety  he  felt  for  Eng- 
land, he  unaffectedly  closed  his  sonnet  by  emphasizing 
affection  for  his  country  in  an  image  of  the  child  whose 
devotion  is  whole-hearted  and  unquestioning.  ^  In  his  most 
insi)ired  lines,  as  well  as  in  those  which  show  him  doggedly 
hut  vainly  attempting  to  practice  the  theory  of  his  Preface, 
Wordsworth  is  never  far  from  contemplation  of  the  simple 
thoughts  and  emotions  of  children. 

As  a  schoolboy  at  Hawkeshead  he  had  observed  chil- 
dren with  a  discriminating  eye.  When  he  returned  during 
the  summer  vacation  after  his  first  year  at  Cambridge,  he 
noticed  that  a  change  had  come  over  children  of  those 
"Whose  occupation  I  really  loved."  It  was  a  change  Hke 
that  wrought  by  an  eight-days'  absence  from  a  garden  in 

** '  pale-faced  babes  whom  I  had  left 

In  arms,  now  rosy  prattlers  at  the  feet 
Of  a  pleased  grandame  tottering  up  and  down ; 
And  growing  girls  whose  beauty,  filched  away 
With  all  its  pleasant  promises,  was  gone 
To  deck  some  slighted  playmate's  homely  cheek.  - 

^  Poems  Dedicated  to  National  Independence  and  Liberty, 
XVII. 

2  The  Prelude  (IV,  203-208). — Grandchildren  are  not  fre- 
quently mentioned  during  the  century  before  Wordsworth.  He 
notices  them  again  in  Descriptive  Sketches  (1.  152),  Anticipation, 
and  in  The  JVestmoreland  Girl  (To  My  Grandchildren).  Burns 
has  suggestive  lines  in  New  year's  Day  and  Second  Epistle  to  Davie. 


304  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Unlike  the  bachelor  poets  of  the  eighteenth  century  (in 
Lines  on  a  Sleeping  Infant  Cowper  takes  refuge  in  generali- 
ties), he  enjoyed  the  inestimable  advantage  of  children  in 
his  own  household,  and  also  the  benefit  of  Dorothy's  *'see- 
ing"  eyes.^  One  of  her  letters  to  Lady  Beaumont  indi- 
cates that  his  delicate  observation  of  traits  that  make  for 
subtle  characterization  even  in  infants  was  stimulated 
probably  by  Dorothy's  sympathetic  observation  of  children: 
"Catherine  is  the  only  funny  child  in  the  family;  the  rest 
of  the  children  are  lively,  but  Catherine  is  comical  in  every 
look  and  motion.  Thomas  perpetually  forces  a  tender 
smile  by  his  simplicity,  but  Catherine  makes  you  laugh  out- 
right, though  she  can  hardly  say  a  dozen  words,  and  she 
joins  in  the  laugh,  as  if  sensible  of  the  drollery  of  her 
appearance." 

In  its  reflection  of  the  fleeting  moods  of  an  individual 
child.  Characteristics  of  a  Child  Three  Years  Old  (1811) 
^v<WMefinitely  marks  Wordsworth  as  a  precursor  of  the  modern 
attitude,  which  tries  to  shadow  forth  in  poetry  such  evan- 
escent moods  as  Wordsworth  recorded  in  his  own  way  by 
reference  to  the  beauty  of  nature.  He  observes  the  child 
when  it  is  alone,  and  when  it  plays  in  the  presence  of  ad- 
miring friends  or  relatives. 

Loving  she  is,  and  tractable,  though  wild; 

And  Innocence  hath  privilege  in  her 

To  dignify  arch  looks  and  laughing  eyes ; 

And  feats  of  cunning;  and  the  pretty  round 

Of  trespasses,  affected  to  provoke 

Mock-chastisement   and   partnership   in   play. 

And,  as  a  faggot  sparkles  on  the  hearth, 

Not  less  if  unattended  and  alone 

Than  when  both  young  and  old  sit  gathered   round 

And  take  delight  in  its  activity; 

1  The  Prelude,  XIV,  232ff. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  305 

Even   so   this   happy   Creature   of  herself 

Is  all-sufficient ;  solitude  to  her 

Is  blithe  society,  who  fills  the  air 

With  gladness  and  involuntary  songs. 

Light  are  her  sallies  as  the  tripping  fawn's 

Forth-startled  from  the  fern  where  she  lay  couched; 

Unthought-of,  unexpected,  as  the  stir 

Of  the  soft  breezes  ruffling  the  meadow-flowers, 

Or  from  before  it  chasing  wantonly 

The  many-coloured  images  imprest 

Upon  the  bosom  of  a  placid  lake. 

Dorothy  has  adapted  herself  exquisitely  to  the  child's 
point  of  view  in  the  Address  to  a  Child  During  a  Boisterous  ^ 
Winter  Evening  (1806).  Without  a  sug^gestion  of  teach- 
ing, the  lines  picture  Dorothy  and  the  child  by  the  winter- 
evening  fireside.  The  fireside  matter  has  here  been  de- 
veloped with  delicate  attention  to  the  thought  life  and  emo- 
tional reactions  of  an  individual  child.  He  is  no  longer, 
as  before  Burns,  merely  present,  but  his  interest  in  the 
phenomena  of  a  winter  storm  determines  the  choice  of 
\  imagery. 

Hark!  over  the  roof  he  makes  a  pause. 

And  growls  as  if  he  would  fix  his  claws 

Right  in  the  slates,  and  with  a  huge  rattle 

Drive  them  down,  like  men  in  battle: 

— But  let  him  range  round ;  he  does  us  no  harm, 

We  build  up  the  fire,  we're  snug  and  warm ; 

Untouched  by  his  breath  see  the  candle  shines  bright. 

And  burns  with  a  clear  and  steady  light; 

Books  have  we  to  read, — but  that  half-stifled  knell. 

Alas!  'tis  the  sound  of  the  eight  o'clock  bell. 

— Come  now  we'll  to  bed  !  and  when  we  are  there 

He  may  work  his  own  will,  and  what  shall  we  care? 

He   may  knock   at   the   door, — we'll   not   let   him   in ; 

May  drive  at  the  windows, — we'll  laugh  at  his  din  ; 

Let  him  seek  his  own  home  wherever  it  be ; 

Here's  a  code  warm  house  for  Edward  and  me. 


{ 


306  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

There  is  a  suggestion  of  humor  in  the  story  of  the  mi- 
gration of  the  poor  priest  from  Northumiberland  to  the 
Lakes.  In  their  old  age  the  priest  and  his  wife  never  tired 
of  recounting  their  experiences  on  the  road.  The  motley 
train  of  horses  with  jingling  bells  and  panniers,  and  the  ass 
which  carried  their  children,  excited  the  curiosity  of  many 
a  village  Dogberry  and  "staid  guardian  of  the  public  peace." 
Wordsworth  singles  out  the  priest's  children  (The  Excur- 
sion, VII,  72-y6)  : 

Rocked  by  the  motion  of  a  trusty  ass 
Two  ruddy  children  hung,  a  well-poised  freight, 
Each  in  a  basket  nodding  drowsily ; 
Their  bonnets,    I    remember,   wreathed   with   flowers, 
Which   told   it  was   the   pleasant   month   of  June. 

^       On   the   basis   of   his    poetry    it   would   be   possible    to 
I  reconstruct  the  life  of  a  young  child  from  the  moment  of 
1  its  birth.     He  does   not  relegate  children   to  a   similitude, 
"l)ut  in  all  his  poems  reveals  a  personal  interest.     The  in- 
fant at  the  moment  of  its  birth  is  interesting  to  the  poet 
who  has  brooded  on  the  destiny  of  man.     He  carries  on 
the  eighteenth-centurv  desire  for  children  in  the  home,  as 
in  The  Warning  (1833),  where  the  humble  cottage  is 

blest 
With  a  new  visitant,  an   infant  guest. 

The  lines  To  the  Reverend  Dr.  Wordstvorth  (1820)  con- 
tain charming  glimpses  of  the  age-old  custom  of  minstrels 
who  played  their  Christmas  tunes  under  cottage  windows,  a 
custom  not  noted  in  connection  with  childhood  by  poets 
during  the  century  before  Wordsworth.  At  such  times  un- 
bidden tears  rise 

For  names  once  heard,  and  heard  no  more; 
Tears  brightened  by  the  serenade 
For  infant  in  the  cradle  laid. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  307 

In  The  Excursion  {V,  278)  he  notices  the  infant  at  time  of 
baptism,   "a  day  of  solemn   ceremonial,"   the   infant  being 

For    this    occasion    daintily    adorned, 
At  the  baptismal  font. 

where  the  consecrating  element  cleanses  "the  original  stain" 
and  "corrupt  affections,"  and  where, 

high  as  the  thought  of  man 
Can   carry  virtue,   virtue   is  professed. 

(V,   287-288) 

His  sonnet  Baptisui  (1827)  likewise  indicates  that  Words- 
worth did  not  follow  literally  the  doctrine  of  natural  good- 
ness. In  addition  to  the  ceremony  itself  he  notices  the 
circle  of  family  and  friends  at  the  font,  the  infant  being, 
meanwhile,  not  overlooked. 

In  his  lines  To  the  Moon  (1835)  he  gives  a  charming 
glimpse  of  the  gestures  of  an  infant  attracted  by  the 
moon,  whose  powers 

are  charms 
That    fascinate    the   very    Babe    in    arms, 
While  he,  uplifted  towards  thee,  laughs  outright, 
Spreading  his  little  palms  in  his  glad  Mother's  sight. 

Dorothy's  The  Cottager  to  her  Infant  (1805),  "sug- 
gested to  her  while  beside  my  sleeping  children,"  is  a 
homely  lullaby  not  at  all  conceived  in  the  traditional  man- 
ner. Details  of  the  cottage  are  those  which  would  naturally 
attract  an  infant.  The  song,  which  seems  to  be  spontan- 
eously suggested  while  the  mother  is  singing  to  her  babe, 
gives  a  realistic  air  of  improvisation. 

The  days  are  cold,  the  nights  are  long, 
The  north-wind   sings  a   doleful   song; 
Then  hush  again  upon  my  breast ; 
All  merry  things  are  now  at  rest, 
Save  thee,  my  pretty  Love ! 


308  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  kitten  sleeps  upon  the  hearth, 
The    crickets    long    have    ceased    their    mirth; 
There's  nothing  stirring  in  the  house 
Save  one  wee,  hungry,  nibbling  mouse, 
Then  why  so  busy  thou? 

Nay !  start  not  at  that  sparkling  light ; 
'Tis  but  the  moon  that  shines  so  bright 
On  the  window  pane  bedropped  with  rain :    . 
Then,  little  Darling!  sleep  again, 
And  wake  when  it  is  day. 

Lullabies  are  rare  in  the  century  from  Prior  to  Words- 
worth, probably  because  it  was  the  age  of  reason  and  en- 
lightenment;  and  the  strength  of  the  dissenting  element, 
which  would  not  be  in  sympathy  with  the  beautiful  con- 
ception of  the  Virgin  and  Child,  militated  against  a  spon- 
taneous lyrical  phrasing  of  lullabies  conceived  in  the  me- 
dieval tradition.  Watts's  lullaby  is  essentially  Puritanical. 
It  is  not  until  Coleridge's  The  Virgins  Cradle  Hymn,  which 
he  translated  from  a  Latin  hymn  "copied  from  a  print  of 
the  Virgin,  in  a  Roman  Catholic  village  in  Germany,"  that 
the  tender  mother  spirit  of  the  medieval  lullabies  finds 
recognition  among  Romantic  poets.  ^  Although  Blake 
combines  naturalistic  thought  and  Christian  phrasing  in  his 
lullabies,  he  was  too  much  out  of  sympathy  with  the  Church 
to  enter  into  the  spirit  of  the  Cradle  Hymns  of  the  Virgin. 
How  far  removed  even  the  transcendental  Coleridge  was 
from  the  traditional  spirit  of  the  Virgin  and  Child  is  patent 
in  his  Christmas  Carol  ("The  shepherds  went  their  hasty 
way"),  which  Bullen  justly  criticizes  for  ineptness  of  phras- 
ing.    Dorothy  Wordsworth  has  altogether  left  the  tradition- 

1  Thomas   Warton's   On   Sir  Joshua  Reynolds'  Painted    Win- 
dow (at  New  College,  Oxford),  1782,  has  the  lines: 

Heaven's  golden  emanation,  gleaming  mild 
O'er  the  mean  cradle  of  the  Virgin's  Child. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  309 

al  element  in  order  to  sing  in  the  mood  of  a  cottage  mother 
who,  in  crooning  over  her  babe,  weaves  in  the  commonest 
facts  of  household  observation.  The  two  additional  stanzas, 
composed  by  Wordsworth,  clearly  mark  the  lullaby  as  a 
north  of  England  mother's  song. 

Coleridge's  A  Child's  Evening  Prayer,  written  for  chil- 
;  dren,  gives  simple  expression  to  sentiments  which  a  child 
^  would  voice  in  prayer  for  members  of  the  household.  In 
Wordsworth's  Guilt  and  Sorrozv  the  unfortunate  woman  be- 
gins the  story  of  her  life  by  recollections  of  her  pious  father, 
who  taught  her  in  earliest  childhood  to  repeat  her  evening 
prayers : 

And  I  believe  that,  soon  as  I  began 

To  lisp,  he  made  me  kneel  beside  my  bed, 

And  in  his  hearing  there  my  prayers  I  said. 

Three  poems  associated  with  Dora  Wordsworth  give 
intimate  glimpses  of  the  poet  and  his  daughter.  They  re- 
veal an  essentially  modern  attitude  in  the  poet's  willing- 
ness to  note  an  individual  child,  from  the  manifestations  of 
whose  interest  he  catches  spiritual  gleams  that  cheer  and 
ennoble  the  parent  who  sees  in  his  child  the  hope  of  the 
future.  ^ 

One  of  the  nearest  approaches  he  has  made  to  the 
^  spontaneous  lightsorr^_JQy_i:^£.cbLiidreiUJl_activity  is  found  in 
The  Kitten  and  Falling  Leaves  (1804).  I^'^  spite  of  its 
length  and  the  poet's  tendency,  toward  the  close,  to  moralize 
and  forget  the  infant  in  thoughts  of  his  own  wishes  for  hap- 
piness, the  poem  is  a  "pretty  baby-treat."  Under  the  elder 
bush  in  the  cottage  garden,  "little  Tabby"  works  "Like  an 
Indian  conjuror"  for  the  amusement  of  the  poet  and  his 
infant : 

1  Compare    the    attitude    of    Coleridge    toward    his    infant    son 
Hartley  in  Frost  at  Midnight. 


310  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

That  way  look,  my  Infant,  lo ! 

What  a  pretty  baby-show ! 

See  the  Kitten  on  the  wall, 

Sporting  with  the  leaves  that  fall, 

Withered    leaves — one — two  —  and    three — 

From  the  lofty  elder-tree ! 

Through  the  calm  and  frosty  air 

Of  this  morning  bright  and  fair. 

Eddying  round  and  round  they  sink 

Softly,  slowly:  one  might  think. 

From  the  motions  that  are  made. 

Every   little   leaf  conveyed 

Sylph  or  Faery  hither  tending, — 

To  this  lower  world  descending, 

Each  invisible  and  mute, 

In  his  wavering  parachute. 

— But  the  Kitten,  how  she  starts, 

Crouches,  stretches,  paws,  and  darts! 

First  at  one,  and  then  its  fellow. 

Just  as  light  and  just  as  yellow; 

There  are  many  now= — now  one — 

Now  they  stop  and  there  are  none : 

What  intenseness  of  desire 

In  her  upward  eye  of  fire ! 

With  a  tiger-leap  half-way 

Now  she  meets  the  coming  prey. 

Lets  it  go  as  fast,  and  then 

Has  it  in  her  power  again.   ,    .    . 

His  Address  to  my  Infant  Daughter,  Dora  (on  being  re- 
minded that  she  was  a  month  old  that  day,  September  i6, 
1804)  shows  how  totally  the  attitude  toward  children  in 
this  type  of  poem  had  changed  in  one  hundred  years.  Prior's 
courtly  lines  to  a  child  of  quality  were  written  exactly  a 
century  earlier.  In  Wordsworth's  parental  eyes  the  infant 
is  a  "mild  offspring  of  infirm  humanity,"  and  a  "frail,  feeble 
monthling."  These  phrases  indicate  the  poet's  willingness 
to  face  a  fact  that  does  not  necessarily  embellish  the  subject. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  311 

I  In  his  thoughts  the  child  is  but  one  tiny  manifestation  of 
the  vast  forces  of  the  universe.  In  the  contemplation, 
moreover,  of  what  she  would  have  been  had  she  been 
born  an  Indian  child,  he  is  carried  far  from  Prior's  charm- 
ing make-believe.  The  passages  in  which  he  observes  the 
nascent  smiles  of  the  infant  are  permeated  with  that  spirit 
of  consecration  which  is  associated  with  Wordsworth's  at- 
titude toward  nature  in  such  a  poem  as  Tintern  Abbey. 
The  infant's  smiles  are  "feelers  of  love,"  tokens  and  signs, 
which, 

when  the  appointed  season  hath  arrived, 
Joy,   as   her   holiest   language,   shall   adopt. 

Like  classicist  poets  he  looks  beyond  the  child  into  the  fu- 
ture ;  but  his  forward  look  is  more  accurately  described  as 
vision — *that  feeling  after  an  elusive  something  which 
baffles  expression.  The  urbane  perspicuity  which  satisfied 
the  readers  of  Prior's  day  has  given  place  to  vague,  tanta- 
lizing emotion.  The  tokens  and  signs  of  this  emotion  bring 
spiritual  assurances  with  which  writers  on  childhood  had 
not  busied  themselves  since  the  days  of  Earle  and  Vaughan. 
In  the  appealing  lines  to  his  favorite  daughter  Dora  ("A 
little  onward  lend  thy  guiding  hand,"  1816),  Wordsworth 
recalls  how  he  had  carried  her 

A    tottering    infant,    with    compliant    stoop 
From  flower  to  flower  supported. 

Xow  he  is  her  companion  still, 

but  to  curb 
Thy   nymph-like   step   swift-bounding   o'er   the   lawn. 
Along  loose  rocks,  or  the  slippery  verge 
Of   foaming  torrents. 

Dora  is  her  father's  companion  in  his  early-morning  walk ; 
they  climb  together  to  the  top  of  "some  smooth  ridge"  to 


312  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

feel  the  exhilaration  of  height  and  distance.  He  would  be 
her  guide  through  woods  and  forest 

to  behold 
There  how  the  Original  of  human  art,         v 
Heaven-prompted   Nature,   measures   and   erects 
Her  temples.   .    .    . 

He  reviewed  the  classical  authors  with  her,  and  scaled  *'to 
heights  more  glorious  still"  of  Holy  Writ, 

where  this  Darling  of  my  care, 
Advancing  with   me  hand   in   hand,   may  learn, 
Without  forsaking  a  too  earnest  world. 
To  calm  the  affections,  elevate  the  soul, 
And  consecrate  her  life  to  truth  and   love. 

Poets  from  Thomson  to  the  end  of  the  century  had  given 
many  glimpses  of  the  loving  care  of  parents  for  their  chil- 
dren. Yet  none  is  so  winning  as  this  in  the  sincere  mani- 
festation of  the  heart-felt  companionship  existing  between 
Wordsworth  and  his  daughter  Dora  (she  was  in  tempera- 
ment a  second  Dorothy),  in  whom  he  found  support  in  his 
old  age  after  he  had  been  deprived  of  Dorothy's  companion- 
ship by  the  clouding  of  her  mind. 

(Wordsworth's  insistence  on  freedom  for  children,  and 
their  natural  right  to  enjoyment  of  it  in  undisturbed,  un- 
supervised communion  with  nature,  is  winningly  expressed 
in  one  of  the  most  appealing  of  the  Duddon  sonnets.  He 
"^  observed  cottage  children  at  play  far  from  the  contamination 
of  cities.  There  is  no  suggestion  of  pastoralities ;  Words- 
worth had  observed  these  children;  and  that  he  wrote  with 
his  eye  on  the  object  is  clear  from  the  fact  that  the  cottage 
near  which  the  children  tumbled  has  been  identified.  They 
are  the  companions  of  the  solitude-loving  Duddon,  near 
whose  banks  stood  the  cottage  "rude  and  grey" 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  313 

Whose   ruddy  children,   by   the  mother's  eyes 
Carelessly   watched,   sport  through   the   summer   day, 
Thy  pleased  associates: — light  as  endless  May 
On    infant   bosoms    lonely    Nature    lies.      (V) 

The  natural  attraction  which  rumimg  water  has  for  chil- 
dren is  reflected  by  the  Romanticist  poets,  who  were  them- 
selves ever  striving  to  live  over  again  the  care-free  days  of 
childhood.  Wordsw'orth  is  like  them  in  this  love  for 
streams  and  brooks,  and  when  he  wishes  to  correct  despon- 
dency in  The  Excursion,  he  points  to  the  simple  cottage-boy 
who  is  wholly  absorbed  in  play  at  a  mill-dam. 

"May  I  name 
Without  offence,  that  fair-faced   cottage-boy? 
Dame  Nature's  pupil  of  the  lowest  form, 
Youngest  apprentice  in  the  school  of  art! 
Him,  as  we  entered  from  the  open  glen. 
You  might  have  noticed,  busily  engaged. 
Heart,  soul,  and  hands, — in  mending  the  defects 
Left  in  the  fabric  of  a  leaky  dam 
Raised  for  enabling  this  penurious  stream 
To  turn  a   slender  mill    (that  new-made   plaything) 
For  his  delight — the  happiest  he  of  all !" 

(III.   196-206) 

In  their  endeavor  to  win  man  back  to  a  simple  life,  poets 
instinctively  held  up  the  child  as  an  ideal  example  of  simple, 
if  not  divine,  contentment.  Wordsworth's  wide  observa- 
tion of  children  in  the  Lake  District  provided  him  with  a' 
rich  fund  of  experience.  He  never  ceased  to  draw  upon 
this  in  order  to  give  point  to  the  plea  that,  he  intended, 
should  win  men  by  the  contemplation  of  innocent  child- 
hood which  spontaneously  found  its  richest  enjoyments  in 
the  presence  of  nature.  So  the  group  which  had  l>een  ob- 
serving the  boy  are  led  to  thoughts  of  the  divine  happiness 
for  which  poets  of  the  eighteenth  century  had  longed. 


X 


ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

"Far  happiest,"  answered   the   desponding   Man, 

"If,  such  as  he  now  is,  he  might  remain ! 

Ah !  what  avails  imagination  high 

Or  question  deep?"  (Ill,  207-210) 

Wordsworth  is  ev^r  tln'nl^ing;  of  tlip  prrvblem__of  the  soul  life 
qf__m3iL_  Like  Blake  he  believes  that  all  the  sophistications 
and  reasonings  of  nian  will  lead  man  nowhere.  In  his  poetry 
r-*  generally,  as  in  the  Ode,  he  is  satisfied  to  rest  in  childhood, 

I    because  there  the  sense  of  unity  has  not  been  disturbed  by 

I  Ithe  interposition  of  reason. 

The  Other,  not  displeased, 
Promptly  replied' — "My  notion  is  the  same. 
And  I,  without  reluctance,  could  decline 
All  act  of  inquisition  whence  we  rise, 
And  what,  when  breath  hath  ceased,  we  may  become. 
Here  are  we,  in  a  bright  and  breathing  world. 
Our  origin,  what  matters  it?"  ^  (III,  233-238) 


ktt-^\ 


No  other  poet  has  so  widely  and  sympathetically  ob- 
served  children  in  communion  y^^ith  the  external  nature 
poets  had  exalted  from  the  time  of  Thomson.  Nature  and 
the  boy  led  the  group  to  thoughts  of  ''natural  piety" ;  and 
it  was  Wordsworth's  belief  that  children  were  happiest  and 
I  most  effectively^taught  in  the  presence  of  nature.^ "  ■"■ 

Although  he  preferred  to  write  of  children  in  rural  sur- 
roundings, Wordsworth,  neyertheless,  more  fully  than  any 
poet  of  the  eighteenth  century,  has  observed  children  in 
crowded  surroundings  of  the  metropohs. 

1  "Wisdom  doth  live  with  children  round  her  knees"  (Poems 
Dedicated  to  National  Independence  and  Liberty,  IV). 

2  This  is  likewise  the  attitude  of  Coleridge.  In  Frost  at  Mid- 
night the  "philosopher"  father  contemplates  in  rosy  dreams  the 
boyhood  days  of  Hartley,  who  is  to  receive  spiritual  suggestions 
from  his  companionship  with  external  nature. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  315 

He  often  visited  London,  but  was  not,  any  more  than 
^the  benevolist  poets,  in  sympathy  with  city  life.  In  the  city 
he  pined  a  discontented  sojourner.  He  refers  peevishly  to 
the  shrill  cries  of  London  streets.  Favorite  phrases  are 
"this  noisy  world,"  ''monstrous  ant-hill,"  "barricadoed  ever- 
more within  the  walls  of  cities,"  and  "mean  shapes  on  every 
side."  He  was  offended  by  the  environment  to  which  chil- 
dren were  exposed.  Referring  to  the  ingenuous  moments 
of  his  youth  when  his  outlook  on  life  was  very  simple,  he 
tells  in  The  Prelude  of  the  child  placed  in  the  middle  of  a 
table   surrounded   by  men   and   women   gathered   there   by 

(chance.  After  describing  the  child's  beauty  in  unsurpassed 
lines,  he  fears  for  its  future.  As  the  poet  muses  over  the 
experience,  he  thinks  that  perhaps  the  child  has  grown  to 
an  age  when  he  can  look  with  envy  on  the  babe  who  sleeps 
undisturbed  beside  a  mountain  chapel — the  image  chosen 
to  express  his  preference  for  rural  innocence  and  purity. 

foremost  of  the  scenes. 
Which   yet   survive    in   memory,    appears 
One,  at  whose  center  sate  a  lovely  Boy. 
A  sportive  infant,  who,  for  six  months'  space, 
Not  more,  had  been  of  age  to  deal  about 
Articulate  prattle — Child  as  beautiful 
As  ever  clung  around  a  mother's  neck, 
Or  father  fondly  gazed  upon  with  pride. 
* 

The  Boy  had  been 
The  pride  and  pleasure  of  all  lookers-on 
In  whatsoever  place,  but  seemed  in  this 
A  sort  of  alien  scattered  from  the  clouds. 
A  lusty  vigour,  more  than   infantine 
He  was  in  limb,  in  cheek  a  summer  rose 
Just    three    parts   blown — a    cottage    child — if    e'er, 
By  cottage-door  on   breezy  mountain-side, 
Or  in  some  sheltering  vale,  was  seen  a  babe 
By  Nature's  gift  so  favoured.     Upon  a  board 


316  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Decked  with  refreshments  had  this  child  been  placed. 

His  little  stage  in  the  vast  theatre, 

And  there  he  sate  surrounded  with  a  throng 

Of  chance  spectators,  chiefly  dissolute  men 

And  shameless  women,   treated  and  caressed; 

Ate,    drank,   and   with   the   fruit   and   glasses   played, 

While  oaths  and  laughter  and  indecent  speech 

Were  rife  about  him  as  the  songs  of  birds 

Contending  after  showers.     The  mother  now 

Is  fading  out  of  memory,  but  I  see 

The  lovely  Boy  as  I  beheld  him  then 

Among  the  wretched  and  the  falsely  gay, 

Like  one  of  those  who  walked  with  hair  unsinged 

Amid  the  fiery  furnace.  (VII,  334-37o) 

His  glimpses  of  child  life  in  London  indicate  clearly  that, 
if  he  did  not  always  look  with  approval,  he  did  look  in- 
tently. His  attitude  toward  London  during  his  first  youth- 
ful visit  is  charmingly  described  in  a  beautiful  image  from 
child  life.  Although  he  saw  vulgar  men,  and  observed 
houses,  pavements,  streets,  and  degraded  forms  on  all  sides, 
he  was  not  satisfied  with  externalities,  but 

a  simple  look 
Of  child-like  inquisition  now  and  then 
Cast  upwards  on  thy  countenance,  to  detect 
Some  inner  meanings  which  might  harbour  there. 

(Prelude,  VIII,  535-538) 

Wordsworth's  deep  affection  for  children,  and  his  sym- 
pathy with  the  natural  love  of  parents  for  their  children,  are 
reflected  in  a  reminiscence  of  his  first  sojourn  in  London. 
The  passage  again  reveals  his  ability  to  strike  off  a  picture 
of  city  life,  and  is  in  its  place  among  lines  on  city  children 
as  memorable  as  the  sonnet  composed  on  Westminster 
Bridge,  which  reveals  the  poet  of  mountain  and  lakes  giving 
final  phrasing  to  a  mood  characteristic  of  a  great  city. 
He  had  observed  a  father,  an  artificer,  who  sat  on  a  stone 
near  an  iron  paling  that  enclosed  a  grass-plot. 


WILLIAM    WOUDSWOKTII  317 

there,  in  silence,  sate 
This  One  Man,  with  a  sickly  babe  oiitstretche<i 
Upon  his  knee,  whom  he  had  thither  brought 
For  sunshine,  and  to  breathe  the  fresher  air. 
Of  those  who  passed,  and   me  who   looked  at   him, 
He  took  no  heed;  but  in  his  brawny  arms 
(The  Artificer  was  to  the  elbow  bare. 
And   from   his   work  this   moment   had   been   stolen) 
He  held  the  child,  and,  bending  over  it, 
As  if  he  were  afraid  both  of  the  sun 
And  of  the  air,  which  he  had  come  to  seek, 
Eyed  the  poor  babe  with  love  unutterable. 

file  writes  from  the  point  of  view  of  the  countryman  who 
pities  city  folk  because  of  their  lack  of  fresh  air  and  free- 
dom, and  notes  the  father's  timid  gestures  that  would  shield 
the  child  from  sun  and  breeze,  to  which  Wordsworth  had 
been  accustomed  from  early  childhood.  The  poet's  heart 
was  moved ;  like  Thomson  he  felt  for  suffering  childhood 
everywhere,  but  unlike  him  w-as  able  to  visualize  concretely 
whatever  his  sympathetic  heart  led  him  to  observe.  It  is 
characteristic  of  his  wide  interest  in  children  that  he  should 
have  noticed  among  the  "fermenting  mass  of  human-kind" 
in  London  this  detail  of  the  father  with  his  sickly  child. 

In  Power  of  Music  (1806)  the  street  fiddler  holds  men, 
women,  and  children  spellbound. 

That  errand-bound  'Prentice   was  passing  in  haste — 
What  matter !  he's  caught — and  his  time  runs  to  waste. 

The  fiddler  wins  coins  from  old  and  young, 

and   there ! 
The    ouc-pennied    Boy    has    his    penny    to    spare. 

Even  the  cripple  responds  to  the  rhythm  ;  and  the  poet  ob- 
serves 

That  Mother,  whose  spirit  in  fetters  is  bound. 

While  she  dandles  the  Babe  in  her  arms  to  the  sound. 


318  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  earlier  Reverie  of  Poor  Susan  (1797)  shows  how  a 
country-bred  girl  is  moved  by  the  song  of  a  caged  thrush 
to  forget  momentarily  the  hard  streets  of  London  in  recol- 
lection of  her  native  fields.  Wordsworth  transmutes  city 
surroundings  into  scenery  of  her  native  valley. 

Bright  volumes  of  vapour  through  Lothbury  glide, 
And  a  river  flows  on  through  the  vale  of  Cheapside. 

Green  pastures  she  views  in  the  midst  of  the  dale, 
Down  which  she  so  often  has  tripped  with  her  pail; 
And  a  single  small  cottage,  a  nest  like  a  dove's. 
The  one  only  dwelling  on  earth  that  she  loves. 

Crowds  of  men  and  women  and  the  noises  of  traffic 
never  appealed  to  Wordsworth  as  they  did  to  Charles  Lamb, 
who  felt  it  impossible  to  be  dull  in  Fleet  Street,  and  who 
while  walking  about  London  streets  at  night  shed  tears  be- 
cause of  the  "fulness  of  joy  at  so  much  life."  Solitude  was 
essential  to  Wordsworth's  being;  the  Wordsworth  Con- 
cordance notes  more  than  two  hundred  instances  of  the 
words  "solitude"  and  "solitary."  He  is  attracted  by  the 
more  tranquil  side  streets  w^here  he  is  free  to  observe  a 
father  with  his  sick  child,  or  poor  Susan,  or  the  fiddler  and 
his  audience.  .He  can  and  does  depict  with  poetic  power 
and  sure  sense  for  suggestive  detail  the  endless  stream  of 
men  and  moving  things ;  the  dance  of  colors,  lights,  and 
forms ;  the  deafening  din ;  the  endless  rows  of  facades ;  and 
shop  after  shop  with  inscriptions  and  flaring  signs.  But 
he  impatiently  escapes  from  these  as  from  an  enemy,  and 
turns 

Abruptly  into  some  sequestered  nook, 

Still  as  a   sheltered  place   where   winds   blow   loud! 

(Prelude,  VII,  170-171) 

Here  sights  and  sounds  come  at  intervals  only ;  but  he  has 
sketched    them    with    notice   of    street   amusements    chiefly 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  319 

designed  for  children.     There  are  dancing  dogs,  or  he  sees 
a  dromedary  with  performing  monkeys  on  his  back ;  or 

a  raree-show   is  here, 
With  children  gathered  round. 

(Prelude,  VII,  174-175) 

Before  Wordsworth,  such  elements  as  the  raree-show 
appeared  only  in  satirical  verse ;  but  Wordsworth  has  treated 
amusements  of  children  in  a  mood  of  high  seriousness  that 
catches  spiritual  connotations  not  noticed  by  poets  of  the 
eighteenth  century.  These  elements  are  more  congenial  to 
Wordsworth  when  he  can  observe  them  at  a  rural  fair  in  one 
of  the  dales  among  his  native  hills,  where  on  the  green 

stands  a  speech-maker  by  rote, 
Pulling  the  strings  of  his  boxed  raree-show 

among  the  itinerant  hawkers  and  other  country-fair  attrac- 
tions for  young  and  old. 

The   children   now   are   rich,    for   the   old    today 

Are  generous  as  the  young  ... 

The  days  departed  start  again  to  life. 

And  all  the  scenes  of  childhood  reappear. 

Faint,  but  more  tranquil.  (VIII,   44-51) 

Gaiety  and  clieerfulness  prevail  among  old  and  young;  yet 
to  the  brooding  poet 

How  little  they,  they  and  their  doings,  seem, 

And  all  that  they  can  further  or  obstruct! 

Through  utter  weakness  pitiably  dear. 

As  tender  infants  are:  and  yet  how  great! 

For  all  things  serve  them.  (VIII,  59-63) 

They  are  ministered  to  by  rocks,  clouds,  and 

The  wild  brooks  prattling  from  invisible  haunts; 
And  old  Ilelvellyn,  conscious  of  the  stir 
Which    animates    this    day    their    calm    abode. 

(VIII,   67-69) 


// 


320  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

/In  the  ''turbulent"  city  Wordsworth  felt  the  debt  he  owed 
I  to  nature  and  ''rural  peace,"  where  his  heart  had  been  first 
lopened  to  beauty.     He  has  enriched  the  material  of  satirical 
poets  by  throwing  over  commonplace  events  and  experiences 
a  halo  born  of  imaginative  treatment  stirred  by  deep  emo- 
tion. ^ 

In  their  preoccupation  with  sohtude  in  forests  and  by 
streams,  poets  had  overlooked  the  possibilities  of  holidays 
enjoyed  by  children  at  fairs,  theatres,  and  amusement 
places.  Prior's  Ahna  (1718)  gives  only  a  side  glance  to 
Smithfield  Fair.  ^  It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  only  full  and 
detailed  picture  of  a  city  amusement  resort  should  have 
been  drawn  as  observed  by  the  boy  from  a  remote  shire  in 
the  north  of  England.  It  was  to  be  expected  that  he 
would  be  profoundly  moved  by  the  orators  in  Parliament. 

Oh!  the  beating  heart, 
When  one  among  the  prime  of  these  rose  up, — 
One,  of  whose  name  from  childhood  we  had  heard 
Familiarly,  a  household  term,  like  those, 
The   Bedfords,   Glosters,   Salisburys,   of  old 
Whom  the  fifth  Harry  talks  of.  (VII,  493-498) 

This  is  the  mood  of  a  boy  bred  like  Wordsworth  to  solid 
stability  and  faith  in  British  institutions ;  it  is  in  harmony 
too  with  his  characteristic  elevation  of  spirit.  His  vivid 
lines  on  Bartholomew  Fair  come  somewhat  as  a  surprise. 
Temperamentally  out  of  sympathy  with  the  perpetual  whirl 

1  Contrast  the  luxuriant  imagery  of  Frost  at  Midnight. 

2  Now  mark,  dear  Richard,  from  the  age 
That  children  tread  this  worldly  stage. 
Broom-staff  or  poker  they  bestride. 
And  round  the  parlour  love  to  ride; 
Till  thoughtful  father's  pious  care 
Provides  his  brood,  next  Smithfield  Fair, 

With   supplemental   hobby-horses.  (Canto    I) 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  321 

of  trivial  objects  and  the  anarchy  and  din  "barbarian  and 
infernal"  of  such  a  place,  this  simple  north-country  youth 
was  momentarily  fascinated  by  the 

phantasma. 
Monstrous  in  color,  motion,  shape,  sight,  sound. 

that  constituted  for  him  a  "Parliament  of  Monsters."  What 
fascinated  him  was  that  he  saw  there 

blank  confusion  !    true  epitome 
Of  what  the  mighty  city  is  herself.  j 

To  thousands  upon  thousands  of  her  sons. 

(VII,  722-724) 

It  was  a  shock  for  eyes  and  ears  to  see  how  tents  and  booths, 

as  if  the  whole  were  one  vast  mill, 
Are  vomiting,  receiving  on  all  sides. 
Men,  Women,  three-years'  Children,  Babes  in  arms. 

(719-721) 

The  passa,2:e  depicts  the  motley  spectacle  of  "All  out-o'-the- 
way,    far-fetched,   perverted    things"   in   marvellous   array. 

The  midway  region,  and  above. 
Is  thronged  with  staring  pictures  and  huge  scrolls, 
Dumb  proclamations  of  the   Prodigies ; 
With  chattering  monkeys  dangling  from  their  poles. 
And  children  whirling  in  their  roundabouts ; 
With    those    that    stretch    the    neck    and    strain    the    eyes. 
And  crack  the  voice  in  rivalship.  the  crowd 
Inviting;  with  buffoons  against  buffoons 
Grimacing,  writhing,  screaming. — him  who  grinds 
The  hurdy-gurdy,  at  the  fiddle  weaves. 
Rattles  the   salt-box,   thumps  the  kett!e-<;lrum, 
And  him  who  at  the   trumpet   puffs   his  cheeks, 
The  silver-collared  Negro  with  his  timbrel. 
Equestrians,  tunnblers,  women,  girls,  and  boys. 
Blue-breeched,   pink-vested,   with   high-towering   plumes. — 


322  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

All  moveables  of  wonder,  from  all  parts, 
Are  here — Albinos,  painted  Indians,  Dwarfs. 
The  Horse  of  knowledge,  and  the  learned  Pig, 
The  Stone-eater,  the  man  that  swallows  fire, 
Giants,  Ventriloquists,  the  Invisible  Girl, 
The  Bust  that  speaks  and  moves  its  goggling  eyes. 
The  Wax-work,  Clock-work,  all  the  marvellous  craft 
Of  modern  Merlins,  Wild  Beasts,  Puppet-shows. 

(VII,  691-713) 

It  is  in  fact  a  lively  roll-call  of  what  any  child  would  delight 
to  see,  and  the  passage  reproduces  the  spirit  of  youthful  ex- 
citement and  rapid  change  of  interest  easily  satisfied  on 
such  a  crowded  stage. 

Wordsworth  had  also  been  attracted  by  pantomime  at 
Sadler's  Wells,  which  must  have  been  to  English  children 
of  that  age  what  the  Hippodrome  is  to  American  children. 
With  the  unafifected  delight  of  youth  he  took  his  seat  there 
''more  than  once"  to  see 

giants  and  dwarfs. 

Clowns,   conjurors,   posture-masters,    harlequins. 

Amid  the  uproar  of  the  rabblement. 

Perform  their  feats.  (VII,  271-274) 

Wordsworth's  interest  was  that  of  a  healthy  youngster 
who  with  his  worship  of  nature  could  blend  pleasures  of 
the  average  child.  He  was  one  of  the  noisy  crew  of  school- 
boys at  Hawkeshead,  and  he  was  equally  a  partaker  of  the 
more  superficial  pleasures  provided  by  London  for  its  chil- 
dren.    At  Sadler's  Wells  he  beheld 

The  champion.  Jack  the  Giant-killer :    Lo ! 

He  dons  his  coat  of  darkness ;  on  the  stage 

Walks,  and  achieves  his  wonders,  from  the  eye 

Of  living  Mortal  covert,  "as  the  moon 

Hid  in  her  vacant  interlunar  cave." 

Delusion  bold!  and  how  can  it  be  wrought? 

The  garb  he  wears  is  black  as  death,  the  word 

''Invisible"  flames   forth  upon  his  chest.       (VII.   280-287) 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  323 

Yet,  even  in  those  days,  he  had  made  no  small  progress 
in  "meditatjons_  holy  and  sublinie" : 

Yet  something  of  a  girhsh  child-like  gloss 
Of  novelty  survived  of  scenes  like  these ; 
Enjoyment  haply  handed  down   from  times 
When   at  a  country-playhouse,   some   rude   barn 
Tricked  out  for  that  proud  use,   if  I  perchance 
Caught,  on  a  summer  evening  through  a  chink 
In  the  old  wall,  an  unexpected  glimpse 
Of  daylight,  the  bare  thought  of  where  I  was 
Gladdened  me  more  than  if  I  had  been  led 
Into  a  dazzling  cavern  of  romance, 
Crowded  with  Genii  busy  among  works 
Not  to  be  looked  at  by  the  common  sun. 

(VII,  446-457) 
Although  it  is  clear  from  Ashton's  researches  ^  that  a 
kind  of  entertainment  appreciated  by  children  was  in  vogue 
during  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne,  and  although  it  is  known 
that  there  were  Christmas  pantomimes,  it  is  remarkable 
that  these  are  not  noticed  by  poets  even  in  the  satirical 
vein.  Such  Christmas  theatricals  and  pantomimes  as  are 
designed  especially  for  children  at  Yuletide  in  New  York 
must  have  been  common  also  in  the  London  of  those 
days.  Although  the  Puritans  had  in  1642  made  Christmas 
a  day  of  prayer  and  fasting,  pantomimes  and  Christmas 
plays  seem  to  have  flourished  from  the  days  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  itself.  Merrymaking  is  implied,  for  instance, 
in  Anna  L.  Barbauld's  Groans  of  the  Tankard: 

No  Carnival  is  even  Christmas  here 

And  one   long  Lent   involves  the  meagre   year. 

The  Christmas  Harlequinades  which  were  given  at  Co- 
vent  Garden  and  Drury  Lane  date  from  the  seventeenth 
century,  and   were   at   their   height   under   Garrick.     They 

1  Social  Life  in   the  Reign   of  Queen  Anne,  by  John   Ashton. 
Compare  also  A  Right  Merric  Christtnasse  by  the  same  author. 


324  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

opened  with  a  fairy  tale,  the  characters  of  which  changed  to 
harlequin,  columbine,  and  clown  of  the  pantomime  that  fol- 
lowed. There  were  Christmas  plays  at  Manchester  Gram- 
mar School  during  1739,  1740,  and  1741.  'The  Monthly  Re- 
view" in  1774  has  a  good  review  of  A  Christmas  Tale  in 
Five  Parts,  A  New  Dramatic  Entertainment. 

Children  must  surely  have  been  diverted  by  the  St. 
George  plays  with  Old  Father  Christmas.  Professor 
Manly  quotes  to  show  that  the  version  he  prints  was  ased 
in  the  eighteenth  century:  'The  man  from  whom  I  took 
(it)  down  had  performed  at  Brill  in  the  year  1807,  and  his 
father  had  done  the  same  at  Thame  Park  in  the  previous 
century."  If  the  Lutterworth  Christmas  Play  would  have 
made  less  appeal  to  children,  the  Revesby  Sword  Play,  Pro- 
fessor Manly's  version  of  which  is  dated  "October  ye  20, 
1779,"  would  have  fascinated  them. 

Carey  does  not  notice  theatricals  in  Sally  in  Our  Alley 
(1715),  although  the  thrifty  apprentice  lover  says  that  he 
will  save  his  money  for  Sally  against  the  coming  of  Christ- 
mas. Christmas  is,  indeed,  infrequently  noticed  in  connec- 
tion with  childhood.  Wordsworth  has  more  fully  than 
other  poets  referred  to  the  holiday  which  is  identified  with 
children.  He  has  noticed  it  in  the  Idle  Shepherd-Boys, 
To  the  Rev.  Dr.  Wordsworth,  The  Prelude,  and  The  Thorn, 
and  connects  the  holiday  with  childhood  in  each  poem. 

In  spite  of  all  Wordsworth's  childlike  wonder,  he  is  not 
confused  by  his  novel  experiences  in  London,  but  while  tell- 
ing the  pathetic  story  of  the  Maid  of  Buttermere  is  loyal 
to  his  ideal  of  the  simple  life  far  from  city  excitements,  and 
writes  of  her  in  terms  of  native  fields.     After  her  troubles 
('The  broad  world  rang  with  the  maiden's  name"), 
She  lives  in  peace 
Upon  the  spot  where  she  was  born  and  reared; 
Without  contamination  doth  she  live 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  325 

In  quietness,  without  anxiety : 

Beside  the  mountain  chapel,  sleeps  in  earth 

Her  new-born  infant,  fearless  as  a  lamb 

That,    thither    driven    from    some    unsheltered    place, 

Rests  underneath  the  little   rock-like  pile 

When    storms   are    raging.      Happy    are    they    both — 

Mother  and  child!  (VII,  320-329) 

As  he  noticed  children  everywhere  in  city  and  coinitry 
alike,  so  he  observed  with  a  pectiliar  tenderness  the  graves 
of  children  in  the  lonely  churchyards  of  the  north  of  Eng- 
land. His  Essays  Upon  Epitaphs  reflect  an  Englishman's  in- 
terest in  the  graves  of  the  village  dead.  Americans  who  on 
their  travels  do  not  identify  England  with  London  are  im- 
pressed by  the  unaffected  piety  of  worshippers  in  outlying 
parishes,  who  before  and  after  vesper  service  walk  about  in 
God's  acre,  keeping  green  the  memory  of  departed  friends 
and  relatives.  There  is  nothing  unusual  or  morbid  in  the 
impulse  that  led  Wordsworth  to  write  his  essays,  and  to 
quote  examples  from  memorial  stones.  How  far  he  is  from 
morbidity  and  the  melancholy  of  Gray  or  White  is  clear  from 
the  feeling  lines  on  his  school  companion  at  Hawkeshead, 
who  lived  but  to  be  buried  in  the  village  where  he  was  born. 
Wordsworth  is  not  despondent,  but  his  heart  is  touched  by 
remembrance  of  the  boy  who  was  one  of  the  "race  of  young 
ones" : 

This   Boy  was   taken   from   his   mates   and   died 

In  childhood,  ere  he  was  full  twelve  years  old. 

Fair  is  the  six>t.  most  beautiful  the  vale 

Where  he  was  born;  the  grassy  churchyard  hangs 

Upon  a  slope  above  the  village  school. 

And  through  the  churchyard  when  my  way  has  led 

On  summer  evenings,  I  believe  that  there 

A  long  half  hour  together  I  have  stood 

Mute,  looking  at  the  grave  in  which  he  lies. 

(V,  389-397) 


326  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

The  custom  of  reading  epitaphs  reveals  a  simple  sin- 
cerity that  shows  in  English  people  that  fibre  of  genuineness 
which  Wordsworth  admired  and  exalted  in  the  "statesmen" 
of  the  Lake  District.  We  have  observed  that  Henry  Kirke 
White  had  interwoven  the  custom  with  the  return  at  eve 
of  the  laborer  and  his  children,  and  Wordsworth,  like  that 
father  in  White's  poem,  draws  lessons  from  what  he  reads. 
"In  the  obscure  corner  of  a  country  church-yard  I  once 
espied,  half  overgrown  with  hemlock  and  nettles,  a  very 
small  stone  laid  upon  the  ground,  bearing  nothing  more 
than  the  name  of  the  deceased  with  the  date  of  birth  and 
death,  importing  that  it  was  an  infant  which  had  been  born 
one  day  and  died  the  following.  I  know  not  how  far  the 
Reader  may  be  in  sympathy  with  me;  but  more  awful 
thoughts  of  rights  conferred,  of  hopes  awakened,  or  re- 
membrances stealing  away  or  vanishing,  were  imparted  to 
my  mind  by  that  inscription  there  before  my  eyes  than  by 
any  other  that  it  has  ever  been  my  lot  to  meet  with  upon  a 
tomb-stone."  Among  the  epitaphs  on  children  he  quotes 
this  example : 

What  Christ  said  once  He  said  to  all, 
Come  unto  Me,  ye  children  small: 
None  shall  do  you  any  wrong, 
For  to  My  Kingdom  you  belong. 

Wordsworth's  genius  is  expressing  itself  with  characteris- 
tic simple  beauty  when  he  writes  that  a  pure  woman's  life  is 

As  snowdrop  on  an  infant's  grave.  ^ 

In  a  beautiful  sonnet  he  has  with  unadorned  simplicity 
commemorated  ancient  rites  observed  by  "rude  Biscayans" 
in  the  burial  of  children  who  died  in  "sinless  time  of  in- 

1  Elegiac  Stanzas  (Addressed  to  Sir  G.  H.  B.  upon  the  death 
of  his  sister-in-law),  pub.  1827. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  327 

fancy."  ^  In  the  third  book  of  The  Excursion  the  Solitary 
relates  how  he  lost  his  "blooming  girl"  and  her  brother,  the 
only  remaining  stay  of  his  life ;  and  the  compact  lines  in 
the  Lucy  |>oems  likewise  voice  the  sense  of  loss  experienced 
by  those  who  are  left  behind.  Wordsworth's  meek  spirit  of 
Christian  love  comes  out  tenderly  in  the  epitaph  for  his  son 
Thomas   (1812?). 

Six  months  to  six  years  added  he  remained 

Upon  this  sinful  earth,  by  sin  unstained : 

O  blessed  Lord !  whose  mercy  then  removed 

A  Child  whom  every  eye  that  looked  on  loved ; 

Support  us,  teach  us  calmly  to  resign 

What  we  possessed,  and  now  is  wholly  thine ! 

II 

No  serious  attempt  seems  to  have  been  made  either  by 
Wordsworth  or  by  eighteenth-century  poets  to  connect  me- 
dieval castles  and  ruins  with  childhood.  The  castles  and 
abbeys  of  which  romantic  poets  loved  to  write,  did  not 
prove  suitable  places  for  children.  When  the  earlier  poets 
felt  free  to  leave  Pope  and  the  classicist  tradition,  Thomson 
was  their  chief  inspiration.  They  were  too  strongly  drawn 
to  universal  benevolence  and  the  return  to  nature  to  be 
deeply  stirred  by  matters  of  antiquarian  interest.-  Beattie 
ignored  the  si)ecifically  medieval  element  in  the  ancestral 
seat   of   the   young   Lord    Hay    in    order   to   write   of   uni- 

1  Poems  Dedicated  to  National  Independence  and  Liberty, 
XXIV,  "In  due  observance  of  an  ancient  rite." 

~  J.  G.  Cooper's  Call  of  Aristippus  is  hardly  an  exception. 
Cooper  attempted  to  heighten  the  child's  sense  of  fear  by  having 
him  overtaken  by  night  near  a  ruined  abbey.  Attracted  by  flowers, 
he  had  wandered  in  a  forest,  near  which  he  sank  down  to  rest 
amid  the  "dark  horrors  of  the  night"  and  far  from  a  "fondling 
mother's  sight."  Cooper  localizes  the  spot  near  "Where  an  old 
abbey  stood." 


328  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

versal  benevolence.  Wordsworth  recollected  childhood 
play  within  the  confines  of  ruined  abbeys  and  castles,  but 
showed  no  inclination  to  develop  medieval  elements. 

As  a  child  Wordsworth  played  in  and  about  Cocker- 
mouth  Castle,  Brougham  Castle,  and  Furness  Abbey.  Yet 
in  all  recollections  he  subordinates  the  romantic  element, 
where  he  is  conscious  of  it  at  all,  to  his  love  of  nature. 
Cockermouth  Castle  is  of  interest  to  him  only  in  so  far  as 
the  river  Derwent  reflected  the  shadow  of  the  towers  of  that 
"shattered  monument  of  feudal  sway."  In  the  Address 
from  the  Spirit  of  Cockermouth  Castle  the  tower  is  a  com- 
peer stricken  like  himself  in  years.  When  as  a  child  he 
entered  the  dungeon,  he  became  a  "prey  to  soul-appalling 
darkness,"  but  only  with  the  conventional  result  that  his 
thoughts  were  led  to  the  darkness  of  the  grave.  He  chased 
the  butterfly  in  the  "green  courts,"  or  climbed  the  battle- 
ments to  gather  flowers.  This  is  certainly  not  the  spirit 
of  romance.  ^ 

1  Lovibond's  On  Rebuilding  Combe  Neville  reveals  greater  sym- 
pathy with  nature  than  with  the  castle  background.  Although  his 
attention  is  about  equally  divided  between  nature  and  the  castle, 
references  to  the  latter  are  mechanical.  They  are  hardly  merged 
with  the  recollection  of  Lovibond's  youthful  roamings  within  the 
confines  of  Combe  Neville,  the  seat  of  the  kingmaker  Warwick. 
The  wars  of  the  roses  are  alluded  to;  gatherings  of  knights  and 
ladies  are  recalled;  Warwick  is  spoken  of  as  tilting  in  the  court- 
yard. But  such  thoughts  are  suggested  by  the  schoolboy's  reading 
rather  than  by  a  mood  induced  by  the  castle  itself.  Such  phrases  as 
"dread  mansion"  and  "gothic  tower"  suggest  more  to  us  than  was  felt 
by  the  youthful  Lovibond.  One  stanza  shows  how  unconscious  he 
was  of  the  romantic  possibilities  of  the  castle.  He  sought  "thy 
awful  grove,"  not  to  feel  a  pleasing  sense  of  mystery  or  horror, 
but  to  soothe  his  evening  hours  with   "that  best  deceiver,   Love." 

The  morbid  White  must  have  had  remote  sympathies  with  the 
romantic  gloom  of  castles  and  abbeys  (Childhood),  hi  youth  he 
retired  to  the  "gloomy  glen"  to  muse  on  lofty  themes,  ancient  lore, 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  329 

Brougham  Castle,  "romantic"  and  "low-standing"  by 
the  margin  of  a  stream,  served  to  recall  how  he  and  Dorothy 
climbed  the  "darksome  windings  of  a  broken  stair,"  and 
"not  without  trembling"  climbed  along  a  "fractured"  wall. 
The  trembling  was  not  induced  by  fear  of  spirits.  Instead, 
he  and  Dorothy  looked  through  a  "Gothic  window's  open 
space,"  not  like  Keats  into  fairy  lands  forlorn,  but  upon  a 
"far-stretching  landscape."  Or  they  "lay  on  some  turret's 
head"  listening  to  the  breeze  as  it  lightly  waved  the  tufts  of 
grass  and  harebells.  Their  interest  was  chiefly  in  natural 
beauty.  The  castle,  in  spite  of  the  mention  of  architectural 
details,  is  nothing  more  than  a  convenient  belvedere.  ^ 

and  heroes  of  old.  By  this  time  the  modern  reader  is  on  the 
alert  for  romantic  moods.  White  is  in  fact  thinking  of  Britomart, 
Una.  and  "courteous  Constance."  On  his  evening  walk,  as  he 
gazed  up  to  the  clouds,  his  fancy 

stately  towers  descried,  sublimely  high, 
In   Gothic  grandeur   frowning  on   the   sky. 

But  here  again  the  glimpse  of  romantic  matter  is  fleeting,  and  con- 
nected only  vaguely  with  his  reminiscences  of  youthful  walks. 

In  Net  ley  Abbey,  W.  Sotheby,  Esq.,  briefly  notices  the  senti- 
mental attitude  of  his  boyish  days.  "At  day's  dim  close"  he  had 
often  stopped  to  meditate 

where  first  arose 
The  pointed   ruin   peeping  o'er   the   wood. 

He  ascribes  the  mood  to  childhood :  "with  life's  gay  dawn  th' 
illusions  cease." 

^  Jago's  Edge  Hill  (1767)  shows  premonitions  of  the  value  of 
romantic  material.  It  is  difficult  for  readers  of  Scott  and  Tenny- 
son to  realize  just  how  much  was  associated  in  Jago's  mind  with 
such  romantic  names  as  Kenilworth,  Guy  of  Warwick.  Coventry, 
and  Godiva.  Such  embellishments  of  medieval  castles  as  the 
moat  and  portcullis  are  treated  in  the  enumerative  style.  Jago's 
poem  is  topographical  and  has  to  do  with  the  district  near  War- 


330  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

His  references  to  ruined  shrines  and  temples  are  also 
bare  of  detail,  as  in  The  Prelude,  when  he  merely  notices 
Druidic  remains  or  recalls  in  passing  the  "chaunted  rites" 
which  daily  served  the  shrine  of  "Our  Lady"  on  an  island 
in  Lake  Windermere.  He  seems  to  feel  little  irreverence  in 
boyish  escapades  among  the  ruins  of  Furness  Abbey  in  the 
*'Vale  of  Nightshade,  to  St.  Mary's  honor  built."  He  and 
his  schoolfellows  whipped  and  spurred  their  horses,  and  flew 
through  the  chantry  in  ''uncouth  race,"  past  the  "cross- 
legged  knight  and  the  stone  abbot,"  and  out  through  open- 
ings in  the  ruined  walls.  If  Wordsworth  does  not  respond 
to  the  medieval  relics,  his  spirit  is  moved  by  that  "single 
wren"  that  sang  so  sweetly  in  the  ruined  nave  that  the  poet 
could  have  lived  there  forever  "to  hear  such  music."  The 
emphasis  is  on  this  element  of  natural  beauty,  although  he 
seems  to  make  a  crude  attempt  to  phrase  something  of 
romantic  awe,  hut  even  here  in  terms  of  nature.  There 
were  faint 

wick.  In  recalling  Beaudesert,  "old  Montfort's  lofty  seat,"  where 
he  ranged  in  childhood,  he  was  unable  to  merge  his  feeling  for 
castles  with  his  childish  experiences. 

In  the  Ruins  of  Pontefract  Castle  (1756),  Langhorne  is  ab- 
sorbed in  the  physical  danger  attendant  upon  walking  or  standing 
near  ruined  walls.  The  frightened  peasant,  who  steps  swiftly 
by,  feels  for  himself  only  the  same  physical  fear  that  prompts  the 
"pale  matron"  to  call  her  "heedless"  children  from  the  "threat- 
ening wall."  Neither  is  moved  by  the  spirit  of  awe  that  later 
writers  connected  with  ruins.  Joseph  Warton's  To  Fancy  contains 
a  passage  conceived  in  the  same  mood : 

Or    to    some    abbey's    mouldering    towers, 
Where,  to  avoid  cold  wintry  showers. 
The  naked  beggar  shivering  lies, 
While   whistling   tempests    round    her    rise, 
And  trembles  lest  the  tottering  wall 
Should  on  her  sleeping  infants  fall. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  331 

Internal  breezes,  sobbings  of  the  place 
And    respirations,    from    the    roofless    walls 
The    shuddering    ivy    dripped    large    drops. 

(Prelude.  II,  122-124) 

In  the  use  of  specifically  medieval  elements  in  their  in- 
fluence on  childhood,  Wordsworth,  therefore,  shows  no  ad- 
vance over  previous  poets. 

Before  he  reached  the  stage  of  poetic  development  which 
gave  him  power  to  phrase  a  vivid  sense  of  mysterious  awe, 
felt  by  him  as  an  emanation  from  natural  objects  in  wood 
or  field,  Wordsworth  experimented  with  horrific  elements 
that  derive  from  Blair,  the  ballads,  and  the  German  school 
of  horror.  He  refers  in  the  Preface  to  ''sickly  and  stupid 
German  tragedies,"  but  was  himself  temj>orarily  under  the 
sway  of  their  methods  in  such  a  poem  as  The  Thorn  and 
his  tragedy  The  Borderers.  He  was,  as  Professor  Win- 
chester intimates,  "influenced  by  the  growing  liking  for  the 
cruder  forms  of  romance  in  drama  and  fiction  at  that  period. 
Certainly  some  of  the  action  and  scenery  of  the  play  recall 
the  bugaboo  terrors  of  Horace  Walpole  or  Monk  Lewis." 

That  Wordsworth  set  out  in  The  Thorn  (1798)  to  em- 
phasize the  horrific  element  is  clear  both  from  his  own  pre- 
fatory remarks  and  from  a  comparison  with  Langhorne's 
lines  on  the  thorn  in  The  Country-Justice.  In  the  choice  of 
concrete  details,  Wordsworth's  poem  represents  an  extreme 
rebound  from  the  classicist  method.  His  intention  was  to 
make  the  commonplace  seem  unusual,  the  approach  being 
by  way  of  exhibiting  "some  of  the  general  laws  by  which 
superstition  acts  upon  the  mind." 

Langhorne's  thorn  is  solitary,  aged,  and  torn  by  winds 
of  the  heath  on  which  it  stands  exposed:  Wordsworth's 
thorn  is  "aged,"  "old  and  grey,"  "a  wretched  thing  forlorn," 
and  stands  "high  on  a  mountain's  highest  ridge,"  exposed 


332  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

to  "the  stormy  winter  gale"  that  ''cuts  like  a  scythe." 
Wordsworth  has  all  the  elements  of  Langhorne  except  the 
moonlight,  which  by  Wordsworth  is  converted  into  the  time 
when  ''frosty  air  is  keen  and  still."  He  adds  to  the  elements 
of  the  earlier  poet  a  specific  and  concrete  quality.  Lang- 
horne proceeds  at  once  to  the  "horror"  which  stopped  a 
"felon  in  his  flight."  The  horror  is  not  supernatural,  but 
is  the  result  of  lack  of  benevolence  in  a  community  put  to 
shame  by  the  tenderhearted  felon  whose  sympathy  is  moved 
by  the  plight  of  the  new-born  infant  found  by  him  near 
the  thorn  and  carried,  in  the  face  of  personal  danger,  to  the 
nearest  cottage.  The  intention  of  Langhorne  is  to  depict 
the  workings  of  universal  benevolence  even  in  the  heart  of 
a  man  hunted  by  officials  of  organized  society.  Words- 
worth, on  the  other  hand,  crudely  endeavors  to  motivate  the 
supernatural  by  reference  to  the  height  of  the  thorn,  which  is 
Not  higher  than  a  two  years'  child. 

He  emphasizes  the  distorted  appearance  of  the  wind-swept 
thorn,  and  takes  out  his  measuring  stick  in  order  to  report 
that  the  thorn  is  not  five  yards  from  the  mountain  path.  He 
returns  to  what  he  considers  the  creepy  style  by  calling  at- 
tention to 

A    beauteous    heap,    a    hill    of    moss, 

Just  half  a  foot  in  height, 

on  which  one  may  see  "All  colours  that  were  ever  seen." 
He  singles  out  a  deep  vermilion,  and  in  the  next  stanza 
speaks  of  "scarlet  bright." 

This   heap  of  earth   o'ergrown    with   moss, 

Which    close    beside    the    Thorn    you    see, 

So  fresh  in  all  its  beauteous  dyes, 

Is  like  an  infant's  grave  in  size, 

As  like  as  like  can  be : 

But  never,  never  anywhere. 

An  infant's  grave  was  half  so  fair. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  333 

And  when  later  he  introduces  the  doleful  Martha  Ray,  clad 
in  "a  scarlet  cloak,"  he  does  so  by  repeating  the  allusion 
to  the  infant's  grave.     She 

oft  there  sits  between  the  heap, 
So   like   an   infant's   grave   in   size. 

In  the  ninth  stanza  he  again  summarizes  his  opening  lines 
and  refers  once  more  to  the  "hillock  like  an  infant's  grave." 
As  if  this  were  finally  adequate  suggestion  of  something 
mysterious  and  gruesome,  he  enters  upon  the  story  of  the 
girl's  betrayal  and  the  connection  between  her  child  and 
the  thorn  near  which  she  often  sat  even  in  inclement 
weather.  The  childhood  theme  is  realized  with  the  same 
painful  literalness  as  the  poet's  exact  measurements.  The 
physical  horrors  of  blood  stains  on  the  moss  of  the  child's 
grave  are  phrased  with  crude  directness.  That  Words- 
worth was  consciously  working  in  the  mood  of  the  school  of 
terror  is  clear  from  the  way  he  incorporates  graveyard 
horrors. 

Some  say  if  to  the  pond  you  go. 

And  fix  on  it  a  steady  view, 

The  shadow  of  a  babe  you  trace, 

A  baby  and  a  baby's  face, 

And  that  it  looks  at  you ; 

Whene'er   you    look    on    it,    'tis    plain 

The  baby  looks  at  you  again. 

As  if  this  were  not  sufficient,  he  adds  that  the  authorities 
who  come  to  examine  the  hill  of  moss  are  frightened  off  by 
the  heaving  of  the  sod  for  fifty  yards  around. 

If  the  poem  could  be  read  as  a  travesty  of  the  sort  of 
thing  Lewis  stood  for,  it  would  be  interesting;  but  Words- 
worth took  the  subject  seriously,  and  the  poem  is  painful 
even  to  the  inner  circle  of  Wordsworthians.  It  is  interest- 
ing to  note  that  the  hillocks  noticed  in  Blair's  Grave  include 
one  "of  a  span  long,"  the  resting  place  of  a  child  that  "never 


334  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

saw  the  sun.''  In  The  Excursion,  Wordsworth  asks  his 
reader  to  mark  a  daisied  hillock  "three  spans  long,"  a  phrase 
which  is  compared  by  Mr.  W.  Knight  with  an  identical 
phrase  in  Biirger's  Pfarrer's  Tochtcr,  from  which  Words- 
worth's phrase  may  have  derived.  The  Thorn  represents 
Wordsworth's  fleeting  interest  in  a  phase  of  romantic  poetry 
which  is  not  congenial  to  his  powers.^ 

He  is  at  his  best  when  he  portrays  in  The  Prelude,  in 
connection  with  reminiscences  of  Hawkeshead  days,  the 
subtler  influences  that  emanated  from  nature  to  teach  the 
boy  the  mysterious  power  of  a  presence  that  can  not  be  seen 
with  the  physical  eye.  He  was  one  of  a  race  of  real  children 
who  went  tired  to  bed  from  boisterous  play.  The  glad 
animal  spirits  which  made  them  healthy  youngsters  were, 
occasionally  at  least,  supplemented  in  Wordsworth,  even  at 
the  age  of  ten,  by  experiences  of  subtler  origin.  He  wrote 
an  epic  of  his  boyish  adventures  ''while  yet  a  schoolboy."  It 
was  a  long  poem  that  included  "my  own  adventures,  and  the 
scenery  of  the  country  in  which  I  was  brought  up."  The 
earliest  extant  verses,  "written  as  a  school  exercise  at 
Hawkeshead  anno  aetatis  14",  contain  these  lines : 

To  teach,  on  rapid  wings,  the  curious  soul 

To  roam  from  heaven  to  heaven,  from  pole  to  pole. 

From  thence   to   search   the   mystic  cause   of  things 

And  follow  Nature  to  her  secret  springs; 

Nor  less  to  guide  the  fluctuating  youth 

Firm  in  the  sacred  paths  of  moral  truth. 

Among  the  genuine  boyish  experiences  recounted  in  The 
Prelude,  that  of  the  stolen  boat  ride  reveals  his  sensitive- 
ness   to    the    mysterious    power    emanating    from    nature. 

1  A  Fragment  (supposed  to  have  been  found  in  a  dark  passage 
in  the  Tower  of  London),  by  Miss  Helen  Maria  Williams,  is 
equally  crude  in  its  attempt  to  arouse  sympathy  for  children  mur- 
dered in  the  Tower. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  335 

Throughout  the  narrative  there  is  a  soHd  substratum  of 
physical  experience,  of  which  he  never  loses  sight,  and  out  of 
which  grew  naturally  his  sense  of  "huge  and  mighty  forms" 
that  were  a  trouble  to  his  dreams. 

By  following  the  natural  sequence  of  the  boy's  psycho- 
logical reactions  to  external  phenomena,  iwhich  are  clearly 
visualized,  he  succeeds  in  expressing  his  vivid  sense  of  the 
working  of  mysterious  forces.  Beyond  the  unobtrusive 
allusion  to  his  little  boat  as  an  "elfin  pinnace,''  he  makes  no 
effort  to  add  an  element  of  the  strange  and  extraordinary. 
The  boy  is  enjoying  a  "troubled  pleasure"  because  he  rea- 
lizes that  the  boat  ride  is  ''an  act  of  stealth,"  but  he  is  re- 
sponsive to  the  "small  circles  glittering  idly  in  the  moon" 
as  he  pulls  lustily  at  the  oars.  To  reach  his  chosen  goal 
"with  an  unswerving  line,"  he  fixed  his  eye  on  the  "summit 
of  a  craggy  ridge"  : 

I  dipped  my  oars  into  the  silent  lake. 

And,  as  I  rose  upon  the  stroke,  my  boat 

Went  heaving  through  the  water  like  a  swan ; 

When,  from  behind  that  craggy  steep  till  then 

The  horizon's  bound,  a  huge  peak,  black  and  huge, 

As   if  with  voluntary  power   instinct 

Upreared  its  head.      I  struck  and  struck  again. 

And  growing  still  in  stature  the  grim  shape 

Towered  up  between  me  and  the   stars,  and  still, 

For  so  it  seemed,  with  purpose  of  its  own 

And  measured  motion  like  a  living  thing. 

Strode    after    me.      With    trembling    oars    I    turned. 

And  through  the  silent  water  stole  my  way 

Back  to  the  covert  of  the  willow  tree; 

There  in  her  mooring-place  I  left  my  bark, — 

And  through  the  meadows  homeward  went,  in  grave 

And  serious  mood ;  but  after  I  had  seen 

That  spectacle,  for  many  days,   my  brain 

Worked  with  a  dim  and  undetermined  sense 

Of  unknown  modes  of  being;  o'er  my  thoughts 


336  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

There  hung  a  darkness,  call  it  solitude 

Or  blank  desertion.     No  familiar  shapes 

Remained,  no  pleasant  images  of  trees, 

Of  sea  or  sky,  no  colours  of  green  fields; 

But  huge  and  mighty  forms,  that  do  not  live 

Like    living    men,    moved    slowly    through    my    mind 

By  day,  and  were  a  trouble  to  my  dreams. 

(I,    374-400) 

As  he  looks  back  to  this  experience,  Wordsworth  breaks 
into  a  song  of  thanks  to  the  ''Wisdom  and  Spirit  of  the  Uni- 
verse" which  had  purified  his  feelings  and  thoughts  by 
bringing  him  into  contact  with  enduring  things. 

not  in  vain 
By  day  or  star-light  thus   from  my  first   dawn 
Of  childhood  didst  thou  intertwine  for  me 
The  passions  that  build  up  our  human  soul. 

(I,  404-407) 

Wordsworth's  recollection  of  nocturnal  visits  to  the 
snares  set  by  his  companions  is  interesting  in  the  Hght  of 
Blair's  schoolboy  in  the  graveyard.  In  Blair's  Grave  there 
is  no  motivation  of  the  boy's  fear  beyond  the  superstitious 
awe  commonly  attributed  to  human  beings  who  walk  in 
country  graveyards  while  moon  shadows  are  projected 
across  nettle-skirted  and  moss-covered  stones.  Blair  holds 
to  simple  traditions  of  horrid  apparitions  that  are  tall  and 
ghastly  and  take  stand  over  some  ''new-opened"  grave.  It 
is  the  sort  of  stuff  out  of  which  were  made  those  ballads 
learned  by  country  lads  from  their  grandame  at  the  ingle- 
side.  Blair  is  in  fact  using  material  that  could  have  been 
suppHed  him  by  almost  any  child  in  his  parish  in  Scotland. 
Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  concentrates  on  the  ordi- 
nary remorse  which  any  boy  would  feel  when  alone  in  the 
woods  at  night  after  having  emptied  the  snares  set  by  school 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  337 

companions.  The  boy's  better  reason  had  been  overpowered, 
and  he  had  taken  the  bird  which  was  the  rightful  prey  of 
another.  Ghosts  did  not  pursue  him.  Wordsworth's  art  is 
not,  as  in  The  Thorn,  identified  with  that  of  the  fleshly 
school.  He  states  the  ordinary  facts  of  the  reaction  of  a 
guilty  boy  to  his  awakening  conscience.  He  does  this  not 
in  terms  of  eighteenth-century  moralizing,  but  in  phrasings 
that,  while  not  destroying  the  physical  reality  of  his  en- 
vironment, permeate  it  with  warning  powers  "of  soft  alarm." 
He  spiritualizes  the  phenomena  of  nature.  Blair's  school- 
boy hears  the  sound  of  something  purring  at  his  heels,  and 
then  runs  as  fast  as  his  legs  will  carry  him.  Wordsworth 
heard  "low  breathings  coming  after"  of  "undistinguishable 
motion,"  and  steps  that  were  as  silent  as  the  turf  they 
trod.  They  are  too  subtle  to  be  identified  in  terms  of  Blair's 
traditional  graymalkin  "purring"  at  a  boy's  heels. 

Wordsw^orth,  then,  is  successful  in  conveying  his  sensi 
of  the  mysterious  when  he  holds  closely  to  naturalistic  ele- 
ments, and  makes  no  efifort  to  create  agencies  that  are  not  in 
harmony  with  the  manifestations  of  external  nature. 

Where  Blair  is  conventional  in  the  manipulation  of 
ghostly  elements,  Wordsworth  identifies  the  mysterious 
with  certain  phenomena  of  external  nature.  He  secures  the 
desired  efifect  by  a  high  suggestion  of  something  "more" 
than  what  was  vouchsafed  to  descriptive  poets.  Words- 
worth's penetrative  power  goes  deeper  than  externals:  a 
yellow  cowslip  was  "nothing  more"  than  a  yellow  cow^slip 
to  Peter  Bell,  but  flowers  and  the  phenomena  of  woods  and 
fields  suggest  higher  powers  to  Wordsworth  and  give  him 
thoughts  that  lie  too  deep  for  tears. ^  He  again  and  again 
states  his  faith  in  the  ministrations  of  nature,  as  in  The 
Tables  Turned  (1798)  : 

1  Compare  Gray's  Vicissitude. 


338  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

One  impulse  from  a  vernal  wood 
May  teach  you  more  of  man, 
Of  moral  evil  and  of  good, 
Than  all  the  sages  can. 

Such  a  process  is  perfectly  normal,  for  he  emphasizes  ele- 
mentary feelings ;  and  he  accepts  as  a  fact  in  his  philosophy 
that  *'man  and  nature  are  essentially  adapted  to  each  other." 

Ill 

By  a  ''faithful  adherence  to  the  truth  of  nature,"  which 
in  Wordsworth's  poetry  means  more  than  the  literal  external 
facts,  he  awakens  civilized  man  from  the  "lethargy  of  cus- 
tom" by  reference  to  powers  to  which  any  ''feeling  mind" 
may  awaken  itself  if  man  will  but  be  as  simple  and  natural 
as  a  child.  Wordsworth  recognizes  the  beneficent  supple- 
menting influence  of  man,  especially  as  revealed  in  the  affec- 
tionate teachings  of  a  cottage  mother;  but  he  never  omits 
the  influence  of  nature  on  the  child  mind. 

poor  men's  children,  they  and  they  alone, 
By  their  condition  taught,  can  understand 
The  wisdom  of  the  prayer  that  daily  asks 
For  daily  bread.     A  consciousness  is  yours 
How  feelingly  religion  may  be  learned 
In  smoky  cabins,  from  a  mother's  tongue — 
Heard   while   the    dwelling   vibrates    to    the    din 
Of  the  contiguous  torrent.      (Excursion,  IV,  7^-793) 

In  the  light  of  this  attitude  it  is  only  natural  that  when 
Wordsworth  was  thinking  of  the  problem  of  immortality 
and  met  the  little  cottage  girl  in  the  area  of  Goodrich 
Castle  in  1793,  he  should  see  in  her  simple  faith  a  true  ex- 
pression of  the  cottage  Qhild!s,^,rltual  instincts.  He  is  not 
tempted  to  develop  the  graveyard  background  in  the  mood 
of  Blair,  nor  does  he  drift  into  the  sentimental  sadness  of 
Gray.     He  writes  steadily  with  his  eye  on  the  object.     In 


t>o^ 


i^h^ 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  341 

IVe  Are  Seven  (1798)  the  cottage  child  has  ceased  to  bt 
treated  as  one  of  a  group.  In  this  detached  poem  Words- 
worth concentrates  his  attention  upon  lier  as  an  individual. 
He  not  only  notes  the  details  of  her  surroundings  and  do- 
mestic background,  but  individualizes  her  physically.  His 
deep  sympathy  is  plain  also  in  the  lines  which  analyze  the 
probable  reasons  for  the  child's  reaction  to  his  questions. 
Where  previous  poets  have  not  gone  beyond  the  bounds  of 
play  and  physical  recreation,  Wordsworth  tries  to  penetrate^ 
to  the  innermost  workings  of  the  child  mind.  -J 

The  untutored  affection  of  childhood  is  reflected  in  her 
habits,  which  are  true  to  child  nature  in  the  environment  in       / 
which   she  is   placed.     Her  implicit   faith   is  .naturally  ex-  "T 
pressed  in  the  simple  stanza  of  the  folk  ballad.     All  phases  -1 
of  Wordsworth's  conception  and  expression  are  adapted  to 
the  portrayal  of  simple  child  nature.  ^ 

Wordsworth  ascribes  to  her  all  physical  characteristics 
found  in  connection  with  the  traditional  poetic  conception 
of  idylHc  cottage  children,  with  the  difference  that  he  in- 
dividualizes her  and  allows  her  to  appear  as  a  vital,  living 
being  in  the  dialogue.  He  states  her  age  precisely;  curls 
clustered  about  her  head.  There  is  just  a  touch  of  ballad 
remoteness  when  he  writes,  in  connection  with  her  mystic 
woodland  air,  that  she  was  "wildly  clad."  The  romantic 
suggestion,  in  place  of  a  more  literal  descriptive  word,  at 
once  removes  the  child  from  the  garish  light  of  common 
experience,  without,  however,  destroying  physical  reality. 
Her  beauty,  which  made  the  poet  glad,  is  enhanced  by  eyes 
that  are  "fair  and  very  fair." 

1  He  may  have  learned  from  Blake  something  of  the  elemen- 
tal effectiveness  of  the  question  and  answer  method,  for  some  of 
the  lines  in  We  Are  Seven  seem  to  echo  such  a  question  as  "Where 
are  thy  father  and  mother,  say"  of  Blake's  Chimney-Sweeper  in 
Songs  of  Experience. 


340  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Then  the  dialogue  commences,  in  which  the  poet  is 
worsted  by  the  Httle  maid  who  will  not  concede  that  two  of 
the  family  have  been  removed  by  death.  The  first  stanza, 
in  the  composition  of  which  Coleridge  assisted,  has  pre- 
pared the  reader  to  sympathize  with  her  inability  to  com- 
prehend the  idea  of  cessation  of  being.  Wordsworth's 
analysis  of  child  nature  reveals  a  new  element  in  poetry 
about  children.  Judged  by  the  standards  of  creative  art, 
the  canon  of  Wordsworth's  poetry  reveals  no  greater 
achievement  in  the  presentation  of  a  cottage  child. 

I  Blake's  children  live  out  the  idea  of  vigor  and  vitality 
\that  can  recognize  no  cessation  of  activity :  Wordsworth's 
Ipoem  is  conceived  with  characteristic  tranquillity  and  repose. 
With  simplicity  and  limpid  clearness  it  illustrates  Words- 
worth's philosophy.  Here  as  elsewhere  in  his  poetry  about 
children,  his  interest  is  not  like  Blake's  in  the  "childishness 
of  childhood,"  for  Wordsworth  had  a  ''wondering,  question- 
ing  interest  in _the  child  mind."  which  is  revealed  especially 
m  IV e  Are  Seven  and  in  the  lines  to  Hartley  Coleridge. 

It  is  not  necessary  to  justify  the  child  psychology  upon 
which  Wordsworth  proceeds  in  We  Are  Seven.  It  is  be- 
side the  point  to  argue  about  imaginary  companions;  or  to 
say  that  children  do  not  lie  when  they  refer  to  imaginary 
playmates,  but  that  their  attitude  is  due  to  real  confusion. 
It  is  unnecessary  to  speak  of  their  vivid  sense  of  reality^jn 
play-life,  or  of  their  failure  ^^x  \)(-  rnngnnnQ  nrnTTTippd  nf 
distinguishing  between  intenselv  real  p]ay  moments  and  the, 
world  of  external  fact  which,  as  Wordsworth  says  in  the. 
Od^,  t)ffesSes  upon  them  later  with  a  weight  heavy  as  fmst 
'and  deep  almost  as  life.  It  is  beside  the  point  to  consider 
these  matters,  becauseT^lthough  Wordsworth  had  something 
of  the  semblance  of  a  philosopliy  about  the  relationship  be- 
tween childhood  and  nature,  he  was  out  of  sympathy  with 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  341 

the  scientific  attitude  which  prompted  a  man  to  peep  and 
botanize  upon  his  mother's  grave.  He  intuitively  accepted 
a  fact  of  common  experience  and  ilhistrated  it  in  the  atti- 
tude of  the  child  who  unquestioningly  accepts  the  fact  in 
its  full  simplicity. 

Aside  from  the  interest  which  the  poem  has  ever  com- 
manded as  a  perfect  expression  of  one  phase  of  childhood, 
it  is  of  interest  too  as  an  early  study  that  foreshadows 
Wordsworth's  deep  and  instinctive  faith  in  childhood  as  re- 
vealed in  the  Ode.  In  IVc  Are  Seven  the  child  is  indlvidual- 
ized  and  realized  as  a  human  being  at  the  same  time  that 
Wordsworth  gives  expression  to  his  faith  in  the  child's  in- 
stinctive belief  in  immortality. 

Even  Michael  falls  far  behind  this  poem,  although 
images  of  the  infant  Luke  are  flashed  upon  the  reader.  Luke 
acts  naturally  enough,  and  is  truly  conceived  as  a  cottage 
child ;  but  the  portrait  lacks  the  full  individualizing  lines  of 
]Ve  Are  Seven  both  in  externalities  and  in  moral  qualities. 
Luke  is  the  victim  of  circumstances — fate,  perhaps — and  his 
reactions  to  events  are  pictured  chiefly  in  terms  of  hi.^ 
father's  experiences.  Luke  is  neither  morally  nor  physically 
at  the  center  of  the  poem.  Wordsworth's  sympathy  and 
analysis  are  centered  in  Michael.  The  expository  Fenwick 
note  recognizes  the  fact  that  much  of  the  poem  turns  upon 
Michael's  sheepfold,  the  erection  of  which  was  begun  with 
the  aid  of  Luke.  In  the  return  at  eve,  Luke,  who  has  come 
home  from  the  fields  with  his  father,  is  not  singled  out.  He 
sits  down  with  his  parents  to  the  cleanly  supper-board  with 
its  mess  of  pottage,  skimmed  milk,  cheese,  and  basket  "piled 
high  with  oaten  cakes."  And  in  the  thrifty  occupations  of 
the  evening  hours,  his  activities  are  merged  with  the  father's 
in  the  repair  of  utensils  or  in  the  carding  of  wool.  After 
the  first  one  hundred  and  fiftv  lines,  the  child's  activities 


342  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

(  are  not  presented  in  direct  action,  but  in  the  recollection  of 

I  Michael. 

^  The  reader  is  gradually  carried  forward  to  the  boy's 
eighteenth  year,  at  which  time  unforeseen  misfortunes  fell 
upon  Michael.  At  this  point  the  affection  for  native  fields 
determines  Michael's  choice  of  alternatives,  and  he  decides 
to  send  his  son  into  the  great  city  in  preference  to  selling  a 
portion  of  his  ''patrimonial  fields."  In  the  considerations 
that  lead  up  to  Michael's  decision,  Luke  plays  no  active  part. 
He  is  not  pictured  as  in  any  way  actively  guiding  or  reliev- 
ing the  moral  anguish  of  his  father.  Michael  alone  makes 
the  decision. 

Our  Luke  shall  leave  us,  Isabel;   the  land 
Shall  not  go  from  us,  and  it  shall  be  free; 
We  shall  possess  it,  free  as  is  the  wind 
That  passes  over  it. 

It  would  be  shallow  to  derive  the  pathetic  scenes  at  the 
close  of  Michael  from  sentimental  poetry  of  the  previous 
century.  The  sentimental  tradition  may  be  felt  in  certain 
lines  of  The  Brothers,  but  in  the  simple  affection  of  Michael 
we  feel  the  heart-beats  of  a  father  and  mother  who  must 
part  with  their  only  child,  and  who,  with  dread,  consign  him 
to  the  keeping  of  a  distant  relative  in  a  wicked  city.  Even 
at  the  close  of  the  poem,  after  the  fatal  blow  has  fallen 
upon  him,  and  he  realizes  that  his  son  is  lost  to  him,  Michael 
does  not  lose  heart,  but  resolves  at  the  age  of  eighty-four 
to  climb  the  heights  once  more.  It  was  not  sentiment  that 
prompted  the  laying  of  the  first  stone  at  the  sheepfold  which 
was  never  completed,  although  the  old  man  spent  many  an 
hour  there  after  Luke  had  left  him.  To  Michael  the  laying 
of  the  stone  was  a  covenant  between  father  and  son. 
r  Wordsworth's  exaltation  of  cottage  children  involves  a 
\  fuller  and  more  affectionate  notice  of  the  English  cottage 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  345 

than  is  found  in  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century.  Oi. 
basis  of  his  poetry  it  is  possible  to  reconstruct  the  background 
and  activities  of  cottage  children.  He  notices  how  cottage 
windows  blaze  through  the  twilight  in  the  frosty  season ; 
he  gives  details  of  the  peat  fire;  he  notices  the  frugal  fare 
of  cottage  children. 

And  three  fair  Children,  plentifully  fed 
Though  simply,  from  their  little  household  farm. 

(Excursion,  VII.   162-163) 

He  depicts  the  sad  home  coming  of  Margaret,  Goody  Blake 
gathering  faggots,  and  like  Thomson  loves  to  muse  by  the 
half-kitchen,  half-parlor  fire  in  his  cottage.  The  cottage 
and  cottage  children  lie  at  the  heart  of  his  conception  of  life. 
After  the  disillusionment  following  closely  upon  Eng- 
land's declaration  of  war  against  the  France  which  for  him 
still  stood  for  the  spirit  of  freedom,  and  after  his  loss  of 
faith  in  France  itself  because  of  Revolutionary  excesses,  he 
was  wooed  back  to  nature  and  cottage  simplicity  by  Dorothy. 
Up  to  the  time  "Britain  opposed  the  Liberties  of  France"  he 
recognized  a  continuous  development  from  childhood  to 
man  Ik 


In  brief,  a  Child  of  Nature,  as  at  first. 

Diffusing  only  those  affections  wider 

That   from  the  cradle   had  grown   up  with   me, 

And  loving,  in  no  other  way  than  light 

Is   lost   in   light,   the   weak   in   the  more   strong. 

(  Prelude,  XI,  168-172) 

In  the  period  of  readjustment  at  Racedown  (1795-1797) 
his  love  of  cottage  life  slowly  reasserted  itself,  at  Alfoxden 
(1797-1798)  he  wrote  his  homely  lyrical  ballads,  and  while 
in  Germany  composed  beautiful  lines  about  the  unidentified 
cottage  girl  in  the  Lucy  poems.  Upon  his  return  from 
Germany,  when  he  instinctively  turned  in  1799  toward  his 


344  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

native  fields  among  the  Lakes,  he  settled  at  Dove  Cottage, 
which  is  today  the  shrine  peculiarly  associated  with  his  name. 
In  The  Recluse  he  acknowledged  that  many  other  nooks  of 
earth  have  the  attraction  of  Grasmere,  but  nowhere  else 

can  be  found 
The  one  sensation  that  is  here;  'tis  here, 
Here  as  it  found  its  way  into  my  heart 
In  childhood. 

In  The  Prelude,  he  recalled  at  length  his  own  simple  ex- 
periences among  cottagers  of  the  Lake  District,  from  which 
he  had  been  absent  less  than  a  decade. 

Those  poems  which  are  most  valued  today  were  con- 
^ceived  in  harmony  with  the  moods  and  ideals  to  which  he 
gave  full  expression  in  The  Prelude.  He  saw  in  children 
the  manifestations  which  had  won  him  back  to  nature  and 
selt  after  the  moral  crisis  of  the  nineties.     With  childhood 


he  associated  all  tHaFTshpanl-ifnl  and  ennobling-  in  JtFp^     In 

childhood  man  lives  closesJLJo  nature,  and  it  was  hisfirm 
belief  that  England  could  be  saved  only  if  Englishmen  would 
live  simply  in  communion  with  nature.  His  interest  in  nature 
and  children  was  no^Mthat  of  an  esthete :  he  was  a  hnmani- 
tadan  who  inherited  the  ethical  interest  of  the  benevolists 
from  Thomson  to  Southey. 

After  his  meeting  with  Michael  Beaupuy,  whose  con- 
versation had  stirred  him  to  the  depths,  nature  yielded  first 
place  to  man.  While  in  France,  he  had  been  moved  to  com- 
passion by  examples  of  sufifering  among  the  cottage  poor, 
for  the  amelioration  of  whose  condition  such  men  as  Beau- 
puy were  striving.  Wordsworth's  sturdy  democratic  spirit 
resented  class  privilege  with  its  resultant  abuses,  which  were 
manifest  in  monarchical  France.  Awakened  to  social  con- 
sciousness, he  was  keenly  alive  to  sufifering,  and  characteris- 
tically made  his  point  by  way  of  childhood. 


WILLI  A  >r    WORDSWORTH  345 

When   we   chanced 
One  day  to  meet  a  hunger-bitten  girl. 
Who  crept  along  fitting  her  languid  gait 
Unto  a  heifer's  motion,  by  a  cord 
Tied  to  her  arm,  and  picking  thus  from  the  lane 
Its  sustenance,  while  the  girl  with  pallid  hands 
Was  busy  knitting  in  a  heartless  mood 
Of  solitude,  and  at  the  sight  my  friend 
In  agitation  said,  *'  'Tis  against  that 
That  we  are  fighting,"  T  with  him  believed 
That  a  benignant  spirit  was  abroad 
Which  might  not  be  withstood,  that  poverty 
Abject  as  this  would  in  a  little  time 
Be  found  no  more,  that  we  should  see  the  earth 
Unthwarted  in  her  wish  to  recompense 
The  meek,  the  lowly,  patient  child  of  toil, 
All  institutes  forever  blotted  out 
That  legalised  exclusion,  empty  pomp 
Abolished,  sensual  state  and  cruel  power, 
Whether  by  edict  of  the  one  or  few ; 
And  finally,  as  sum  and  crown  of  all. 
Should    see    the    people    having    a    strong    hand 
In  framing  their  own  laws ;  wdience  better  days 
To  all  mankind.  (Prelude,  IX,  509-532) 

In  those  early  days  of  Revolutionary  enthusiasm  he  still 
believed  in  the  fallacious  doctrine  that  mankind  could  be  re- 
formed by  legislation.  This  attitude  resulted  in  temporary 
disillusionment  and  tlie  moral  crisis  from  which  he  emerged 
with  a  sound  conviction  that  the  highest  hopes  for  man  lay 
in  the  individual ;  and  because  the  child  is  father  of  the 
man,  in  the  child.  By  way  of  the  child,  then,  especially  in 
its  domestic  relations,  and  in  the  duties  of  the  state  toward 
children  in  elementary  education,  he  delivered  his  message. 

While  Dorothy  was  winning  him  back  to  himself  at 
Racedown,  where  he  did  not  find  a  sturdy  and  independent 
peasantry  such  as  is  reflected  in  Michael,  he  saw  what  i)ained 
him  and  was  in  keeping  with  the  background  of  Guilt  and 


346  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Sorrozv;  or  Incidents  upon  Salisbury  Plain  (1791-1794). 
The  widow  with  her  children  in  Guilt  and  Sorrozv  is  effec- 
tively dramatized,  and  his  indignation  is  aroused  by  the 
father  who  had  been  provoked  by  a  ''simple  freak  of  thought- 
less play"  to  beat  his  child  cruelly.  In  the  critical  years  of 
his  life,  when  the  poet  in  him  lay  in  the  balance,  Words- 
worth was  stirred  by  the  humanitarian  spirit  that  had  per- 
vaded English  poetry  for  over  half  a  century  before  1795. 

In  keeping  with  his  strong  local  feeling  and  his  centri- 
petal nature,  which  loved  to  soar  but  not  to  roam,  he  as- 
sociated heaven  and  home  as  kindred  points.  In  fact,  his 
deep  feeling  for  childhood  implies  a  high  conception  of 
home  virtues.  Like  the  poets  before  him,  he  exalted  moth- 
erhood and  the  place  of  the  mother  with  her  children  in  the 
home.  He  would  have  accepted  the  old  English  proverb 
that  a  good  mother  is  worth  a  hundred  schoolmasters,  and 
certainly  wrote  in  the  spirit  of  Lord  Langdale,  who  said,  *'If 
the  world  were  put  into  one  scale,  and  my  mother  into  the 
other,  the  world  would  kick  the  beam." 

His  is  not  a  blind  devotion.  He  saw  his  mother  clearly 
and  truly  as  a  human  mother.  He  is  like  the  benevolist  poets 
in  that  he  could  not  follow  naturalistic  philosophy  in  all  its 
implications.  Wordsworth  had  read  Shaftesbury,  and  re- 
marked that  he  was  "An  author,  at  present  unjustly  depre- 
ciated." He  was  influenced  by  Rousseau  and  the  return  to 
nature,  and  his  humanitarian  thesis  involved  much  of  what 
in  the  native  English  tradition  had  been  developed  on  the 
assumption  of  natural  goodness.  He  wrote  in  The  Prelude 
that  evil  is  but  a  shade  of  good,  a  statement  which  re- 
flects the  doctrines  of  sentimental  comedy  and  domestic 
tragedy.  He  did  not,  however,  logically  apply  those  na- 
turalistic implications  involved  in  the  exaltation  of  primitive 
life  as  represented,  for  instance,  by  the  American  Indian. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  347 

Although  not  expressing  himself  in  the  crude  manner  of 
Day,  he  yet  harbored  no  illusions  about  primeval  purity  in 
savages.  In  the  lines  to  his  infant  Dora  he  draws  a  com- 
parison unfavorable  to  Indian  life.  In  the  course  of  his 
musings  he  reveals  the  essentials  of  his  attitude  toward 
motherhood  by  recognizing  the  value  of  culture  and  the 
graces  of  civilization.     In  the  Indian  mother 

the  maternal  sympathy  itself. 
Though  strong,  is,  in  the  main,  a  joyless  tie 
Of  naked  instinct,  wound  about  the  heart. 

(Address  to  my  Infant  Daughter,  Dora) 

In  the  exaltation  of  his  mother  he  thought  of  more  than 
creature  comforts,  which  occupy  so  large  a  place  in  Cow- 
per's  recollection.  The  essentially  spiritual  and  freedom- 
loving  Wordsworth  praised  his  mother  for  her  wise  self- 
restraint  in  allowing  a  higher  freedom  than  could  be  en- 
joyed by  children  who  were  subjected  to  meddling  and 
''improvement." 

Motherhood  is  at  the  center  of  two  of  his  most  vital 
passages :  one  in  The  Prelude  when  he  recollects  his  own 
mother  and  her  influence  on  his  childhood ;  and  the  other  in 
The  Excursion  when  he  makes  a  plea  for  the  natural  rights 
of  children  who  are  deprived  of  a  mcrther's  influence  because 
an  industrial  age  usurps  her  time  and  saps  her  energy. 

Although  Cowper's  poem  on  his  mother  excels  in  finality 
of  expression,  Wordsworth's  lines  are  of  the  highest  value 
in  a  study  taking  into  account  the  social  as  well  as  the 
literary  influences  that  mould  a  ix)et  and  determine  his 
attitude  toward  childhood.  Wordsworth  responded  obvi- 
ously to  the  new  forces  that  had  as  their  aim  the  ameliora- 
tion of  childhood.  His  attitude  towards  his  mother  and 
her  care  of  him  reveals  his  fundamental  understanding  of 
child  welfare  in  what  is  on  the  whole  the  modern  concep- 
tion. 


348  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Although  not  published  until  1850,  the  year  of  his  death, 
The  Prelude,  or  The  Grozvth  of  a  Poet's  Mind;  an  Autobio- 
graphical Poem,  was  begun  at  the  opening  of  the  year  1799, 
and  was  completed  in  the  summer  of  1805.  During  these 
\ears,  moral  tales  and  systems  of  education,  both  native 
and  imported,  were  still  in  vogue.  Among  the  really  val- 
uable English  schemes  that  helped  to  point  the  way  to  a 
system  of  popular  education  in  1878  were  those  of  Lan- 
caster and  Bell,  sponsored  in  1798,  and  flourishing  side  by 
side.  The  real  difference  between  these  systems  was  that 
Lancaster  proceeded  on  a  wholly  secular  basis,  while  Bell 
espoused  the  education  of  children  in  religion  as  w^ell,  and 
finally  received  the  organized  support  of  the  ''National  So- 
ciety for  Promoting  the  Education  of  the  Poor  in  the 
Principles  of  the  Established  Church  throughout  England 
and  Wales."  Side  by  side  with  these  genuine  and,  for 
their  time,  successful  efforts,  and  in  many  cases  antedat- 
ing them,  were  the  amateur  systems  which  had  sprung 
u])  as  the  result  of  the  Rousseau  impetus  in  Germany 
and  France.  These  were  rapidly  taken  up  in  England  by 
the  writers  of  moral  tales,  and  by  amateur  authors  on  educa- 
tion, and  were  transplanted  in  translations  like  those  of 
Mary  WoUstonecraft  and  Thomas  Holcroft. 

In  view  of  Wordsworth's  pronunciamento  on  the  evil 
results  of  industry  in  its  interference  with  the  inborn  right 
()(  children  to  a  free,  open-air  childhood,  and  in  view  of  his 
attitude  on  the  native  nobility  of  nature's  gentlemen  as  rep- 
resented in  the  ideal  peasant  who  enjoyed  true  freedom,  it 
was  to  be  expected  that  he  would  be  out  of  sympathy  with 
cramping  and  cramming  systems  that  failed  to  catch  the 
spirit  of  freedom  essential  to  his  philosophy  of  life  with 
respect  to  children.  Although  he  was  not  specifically  a 
follower  of  Rousseau,  his  doctrine  of  the  minimum  of  in 
terference,  restraint,  and  guidance  is  in  practical  guise  some- 


f 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  349 

thing  very  much  Hke  Rousseau's  behef  that  with  the  child_ 
one  should  not  gain  time  but  lose  it.  Like  Rousseau, 
Wordsworth  was  not  concerned  with  making  a  man  of  the 
child  as  soon  as  possible ;  he  believed  that  the  child  should^ 
live  the  days  of  childhood  for  what  they  are  rather  than 
as  in  the  institutional  system,  wholly  from  a  regard  for  , 
what  they  promise  for  the  future.  Like  Rousseau,  then, 
and  Blake,  he  recognized  the  individuality  of  the  period  of 
childhood,  and  respected  it.  The  child  iwas  to  be  allowed  to 
roam  at  will  in  books,  but  especially  in  nature,  which  is 
the  breath  of  God.  There  he  would  experience  true  life. 
(Excursion,  II,  28ff.) 

Wordsworth  has  been  frequently  misunderstood  as  con- 
demning, or  at  least  belittling,  the  influence  of  books.  As 
a  matter  of  fact,  he  was  with  Dorothy  a  persistent  reader 
of  English  poetry.  Although  recognizing  the  superior  in- 
fluence of  nature,  he  was  led  to  take  an  unfavorable  atti- 
tude toward  books  only  in  so  far  as  they  were  misused  in 
the  schools  and  amateur  systems  of  home  education.  It  is 
necessary  for  a  true  conception  to  realize  that  he  does  not 
belittle  books,  to  which  he  is  more  than  just.  He  believes 
that  they  have  profoundly  influenced  the  heart  of  man, 
''whether  by  native  prose  of  numerous  verse,"  from  the  lofty 
notes  of  Homer  to  the  "low  and  wren-like  warblings"  and 
ballads  for  common  folk.  Although  he  has  many  times 
spoken  of  the  value  and  delights  of  reading,  perhaps  the 
most  significant  passage  occurs  in  The  Prelude. 

Tis  just  that  in  behalf  of  these,  the  works. 

And  of  the  men  that  framed  them,  whether  known, 

Or    sleeping   nameless    in   their    scattered    graves. 

That  I  should  here  assert  their  rights,  attest 

Their  honours,   and   should,   once   for  all,   pronounce 

Their  benediction;  speak  of  them  as  Powers 

For  ever  to  be  hallowed.  (V,  213-219) 


350  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Wordsworth's  objection  is  wholly  to  the  confinement 
of  children  to  books  and  systems  of  reading  that  exclude 
enjoyment  and  delight  in  the  works  of  nature.  He  asks  how 
he  and  Coleridge  w^ould  have  developed  into  poets  if  in 
lieu  of  wandering  at  will  through  vales  and  over  open 
ground 

We  had  been  followed,  hourly  watched,  and  noosed. 

Each  in  his  several  melancholy  walk 

Stringed  like  a  poor  man's  heifer  at  its  feed, 

Led  through  the  lanes  in  forlorn  servitude.      (V,  238-241) 

--  His  scorn  and  contempt  for  the  model  child  are  ex- 
pressed at  length.  lEarly  trained  to  worship  seemliness  and 
convention,  this  child  is  never  known  to  quarrel.  Words- 
worth condemns  the  sickly  humanitarianism  of  the  child 
that  with  "gifts  bubbles  o'er  as  generous  as  a  fountain." 
Such  a  child  is  never  selfish,  and  no  childish  pleasure  can 
ever  tempt  him.  The  wandering  beggars  ''propagate  his 
name,"  and  dumb  creatures  find  him  "tender  as  a  nun." 

To  enhance  the  wonder,  see 
How  arch  his  notices,  how  nice  his  sense 
Of  the  ridiculous ;  not  blind  is  he 
To  the  broad  follies  of  the  licensed  world. 
Yet  innocent  himself  withal,  though  shrewd, 
And  can  read  lectures  upon  innocence. 

(V,  309-314) 

The  products  of  fashionable  systems  were  far  from  repre- 
senting the  ideal  freedom  which  was  advocated  by  Rousseau 
and  Wordsworth,  and  which  Wordsworth  in  his  abnormal 
love  of  freedom  in  his  youth  carried  so  far  that  his  hatred 
of  restraint  caused  him  to  "turn  from  regulations  even  of 
my  own."  The  cramming  process  then  in  vogue  produced 
infant  prodigies  'who  in  his  eyes  were  little  monstrosities. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  351 

A  miracle  of  scientific  lore. 

Ships  he  can  giiide  across  the  pathless  sea, 

And  tell  you  all  their  cunning;  he  can  read 

The  inside  of  the  earth,  and  spell  the  stars; 

He  knows  the  policies  of  foreign  lands; 

Can  string  you  names  of  districts,  cities,  towns. 

The  whole  world  over,  tight  as  beads  of  dew 

Upon  a  gossamer  thread;  he  sifts,  he  weighs; 

All   things   are   put   to  question;    he    must   live 

Knowing  that  he  grows  wMser  every  day 

Or  else  not  live  at  all.  and  seeing  too 

Each  little  drop  of  wisdom  as  it  falls 

Into  the  dimpling  cistern  of  his  heart.      (V.  315-327) 

Wordsworth's  heart  goes  out  to  the  child,  who  is  not  to 
be  blamed : 

For   this   unnatural    growth    the    trainer   blame. 
Pity  the  tree. 

Wordsworth  could  not  endure  violence  to  child  nature, 
and  like  Blake  rebelled  against  interference  with  the  sanc- 
tity of  childhood.  The  child  could  have  no  freedom  in  one 
of  the  systems  devised  for  his  education : 

For,  ever  as  a  thought  of  purer  birth 

Rises  to  lead  him  toward  a  better  clime. 

Some  intermeddler  still  is  on  the  watch 

To  drive  him  back,  and  pound  him,  like  a  stray. 

Within  the  pinfold  of  his  own  conceit.      (V,  332-^^^) 

Meanwhile  Mother  Earth  is  grieved  to  find  that  all  the 
playthings  she  had  designed  for  her  child  are  unthought 
of;  the  flowers  in  their  woodland  beds  mourn  the  absence 
of  children,  and  the  banks  of  rivers  are  lonely  without 
roving  youngsters. 

What  would  we  not  sacrifice  for  a  glimpse  of  Words- 
worth, Coleridge,  and  Lamb  (for  they  had  grown  up  in  the 
days  of  chap  books  and  Newberry's  volumes,  before  moral 


I 


352  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

tales  had  cast  their  blight)  about  a  table  discussing  the 
pernicious  effects  of  misdirected  efforts  in  contemporary 
education.  They  scorned  "These  mighty  workmen  of  our 
later  age"  who  have  the  skill  to  manage  books  and  things 
so  as  to  make  them  act  on  infant  minds  "as  surely  as  the  sun 
Deals  with  a  flower."  These  people  have  set  up  as  guides 
and  wardens  of  men's  minds,  and  are  sages  who  "in  their 
prescience  would  control  All  accidents,"  and  confine  men 
to  the  road  which  they  have  built.  Wordsworth,  in  despair, 
wishes  to  know  if  their  presumption  will  ever  allow  them 
to  learn  that  a  wiser  spirit  is  at  work  for  mam  Words- 
worth and  his  friends  must  often  have  exchanged  reminis- 
cences of  those  happier  early  days  for  children  when  the 
curse  of  encyclopedic  knowledge  had  not  operated.  He 
longed  for  the  days  of  imaginative,  freedom-giving  fairy 
tales  and  stories  of  wonder. 

Oh !    give   us    once    again    the    wishing-cap 
Of  Fortunatiis,  and  the  invisible  coat 
Of  Jack  the  Giant-Killer,  Robin  Hood, 
And  Sabra  in  the  forest  with  St.  George! 

(V,  341-344) 

He  does  not  hold  back  the  reason  for  his  preference : 

The  child,   whose   love   is   here,   at   least,   doth    reap 
One  precious  gain,  that  he  forgets  himself. 

In  this  connection  he  paid  the  memorable  tribute  to  his 
"honoured  Mother,"  who  died  when  he  was  only  eight.  He 
feels  that  to  "break  upon  the  sabbath  of  her  rest"  in  con- 
nection with  his  condemnation  of  systems  is  almost  blas- 
phemous. He  would  not  link  her  memory  "With  any 
thought  that  looks  at  others'  blame."  She  typifies  the  es- 
sence of  that  beneficent  influence  which  shielded  him  from 
subjection  to  amateur  systems  and  novelties  in  education. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  353 

She  respected  the  character  of  her  children.  She  did  not, 
Hke  many  mothers  at  the  close  of  the  century,  presumptu- 
ously arrogate  the  power  of  close  supervision, 

Nor  did  by  habit  of  her  thoughts  mi.strust 

Our  nature,  but  had  virtual  faith  that  He 

Who    fills    the    mother's    breast    with    innocent    milk, 

Doth  also  for  our  nobler  part  provide. 

Under  His  great  correction  and  control. 

As  innocent  instincts,  and  as  innocent  food ; 

Or  draws  for  minds  that  are  left  free  to  trust 

In  the  simplicities  of  opening  life 

Sweet  honey  out  of  spurned  or  dreaded  weeds. 

This  was  her  creed,  and  therefore  she  was  pure 

From  anxious  fear  of  error  or  mishap. 

And   evil,   overweeningly    so  called ; 

Was  not  puffed  up  by  false  unnatural  hopes. 

Nor  selfish  with  unnecessary  cares, 

Nor  with  impatience  from  the  season  asked 

More  than  its  timely  produce;  rather  loved 

The  hours  for  what  they  are,  than  from  regard 

Glanced  on  their  promises  in  restless  pride. 

Such  was  she — not  from  faculties  more  strong 

Than  others   have,   but  from   the   times,   perhaps. 

And   spot   in  which   she  lived,  and  through   a  grace 

Of  modest  meekness,  simple-mindedness, 

A  heart  that  found  benignity  and  hope, 

Being  itself  benign.  (V,  270-293) 

As  in  Blake's  conception,  all  knowledge  should  be  de- 
light, which  in  Wordsworth's  interpretation  is  to  l>e  found 
in  the  presence  of  enduring  things  in  nature.  He  exalts  his 
mother  for  giving  the  early  freedom  that  brought  him  into 
the  presence  of  nature,  where  infant  sensibility  might  be 
augmented  and  sustained  in  freedom,  the  "great  birthright 
of  our  being."  ^ 

1  Victor  Hugo  looked  back  to  his  mother  with  affection  be- 
cause she  had  rescued  him  from  the  irksome  confinement  of  the 
grammar  school. 


354  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Wordswortli  recognizes  the  same  beneficent  freedom 
from  restraint  in  his  second  mother,  the  school  at  Hawkes- 
head,  where  he  was  not  closely  held  to  routine.  He  notes 
that  the  scholars  might  have  fed  upon  a  fatter  soil  of  arts 
and  letters,  but  says,  "be  that  forgiven,"  for  they  had  gained 
knowledge  without  loss  of  power.  At  Cambridge  he  found 
himself  ill  prepared  for  "sedentary  peace"  and  academic  dis- 
cipline. He  never  read  for  honors,  and  in  choosing  a  walk- 
ing tour  through  the  Alps  during  his  third  summer  vaca- 
tion was  guilty  of  a  "hardy  slight"  of  college  studies  and 
their  rewards. 

For  I,  bred  up  mid  Nature's  luxuries, 

Was    a    spoiled    child,    and    rambling   like    the   wind, 

As  I  had  done  in  daily  intercourse 

With  those  crystalline  rivers,  solemn  heights, 

And  mountains,  ranging  like  a  fowl  of  the  air, 

I  was  ill-tutored  for  captivity.  (Ill,  351-356) 

To  him,  confinement  to  courses  stood  for  instruction,  while 
freedom  for  play  of  the  senses  and  sensibilities  in  fields  and 
woods  stood  for  education. 

Although  not  definitely  correlating  play  and  study  in 
the  curriculum,  Wordsworth  did  insist  on  the  right  to 
freedom  from  supervision  and  control  in  order  to  liberate 
the  child  for  the  natural  guidance  of  woods  and  streams. 
It  is  significant  that  he  named  the  two  first  books  of  The 
Prelude  not  "School"  but  "School-time."  In  his  poetry, 
play  is  in  fact  raised  to  the  level  of  an  educational  force. 
By  play  he  means  rougher  sports  such  as  are  chronicled  in 
The  Prelude;  but  he  means  also  such  subtler  experiences 
as  he  reported  in  the  snaring  of  the  woodcock,  climbing  to 
the  raven's  nest,  and  skating  on  Esthwaite.  In  his  explicit 
recognition  of  the  value  of  play  he  crystallizes  the  thought 
of  Lovibond,  Bruce,  and  Mickle,  who  recognized  play  as  a 
factor  in  character     building.     Unlike  them,  Wordsworth 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  355 

has  developed  his  attitude  in  expository  passages  attendant 
upon  poetic  representation  of  his  autobiographical  exper- 
iences. Gay  as  a  boy  in  Devonshire,  and  Langhorne  in  the 
Lake  District,  had  certainly  enjoyed  many  of  the  sports  re- 
corded by  Wordsworth.  The  time,  however,  had  not  been 
ripe  for  the  definite  statement  of  an  attitude  holding  that 
children  were  not  uselessly  employed  in  the  changes  of  sea- 
sonal exercise  or  play  which  the  year  brings  "in  his  de- 
lightful round."  Wordsworth's  modern  attitude  is  clearly 
phrased  in  the  Duddon  sonnet  in  which  after  a  typical  en- 
comium on  streams  as  companions  for  children,  he  writes, 

Nor  have   I   tracked   their  course   for   scanty  gains ; 
They  taught  me   random  cares  and  truant  joys, 
That  shield  from  mischief  and  preserve  from  stains 
Vague  minds,   while   men   are   growing  out  of  boys. 

(The  River  Duddon,  26^ 

This  is  in  harmony  with  his  belief  that  the  child's  mind 
should  not  show  too  many  traces  of  the  handiwork  of  man, 
whose  meddling  and  systematizing  would  straighten  the 
windings  of  the  Duddon  and  the  Derwent. 

Wordsworth  stands  for  natural  development  with  a 
minimum  of  interference.  Modern  study  of  child  psycho- 
logy indicates  that  his  conception  was  not  merely  idealistic. 
Scientific  observation  has  made  clear  the  need  of  broad 
sense  experience  for  the  young  child,  because,  being  es- 
sentially sensory  and  motor,  his  life  is  made  up  largely  of 
percepts.  He  responds  with  chameleon  rapidity  to  his 
environment ;  every  object  appeals  to  his  senses ;  there  is 
no  mixture  or  confusion  of  motives  to  prevent  him  from 
trying  to  realize  the  physical  concomitants  that  awaken  and 
appeal  to  his  emotions.  The  most  widely  accepted  authori- 
ty holds  that  the  mature  man's  proficiency  in  the  manipula- 
tion of  more  complex  mental  states  is  directly  dependent 


356  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

on  the  richness,  clearness,  and  breadth  of  the  child's  early 
sense  perceptions.  This  is  the  attitude  of  Wordsworth  in 
the  passages  which  lovingly  recall  rosy-cheeked  school- 
boys, the  oldest  of  whom  was  no  taller  than  a  counsellor's 
bag — who  listened  to  the  cuckoo  and  felt  the  presence  of 
an  unknown  power.  Wordsworth  pitied  the  boy  Coleridge, 
who  was  compelled  to  spend  his  school  days  "in  the  depths 
of  the  huge  city"  where  he  was  restricted  in  his  view  of  na- 
ture to  the  "leaded  roof  of  that  wide  edifice,  thy  school  and 
home." 

His  most  extended  exposition  occurs  in  the  fervid  lines 
of  The  Prelude  in  which  he  calls  that  babe  blessed  who  is 
nursed  in  its  mother's  arms  and  "with  his  soul  Drinks  in 
the  feelings  of  his  Mother's  eye." 

For   him,    in    one    dear    Presence,    there    exists 

A  virtue  which  irradiates  and  exalts 

Objects    through    widest    intercourse    of    sense. 

(II.    238-240) 

Such  a  child  is  not  bewildered  or  depressed.  The  hand  of 
love  beautifies  all  natural  objects  to  which  as  a  babe  he  is 
too  weak  to  do  more  than  point.  Having  drunk  from 
love's  purest  earthly  fount  of  tenderness,  such  a  child  clear- 
ly feels  pity  for  whatever  is  unsightly  or  bears  the  marks 
of  violence  and  hann.  Such  a  babe,  growing  up  under 
such  influences,  is  not  an  ideal : 

Emphatically  such  a  Being  lives, 

Frail  creature   as   he   is,   helpless   as   frail, 

An  inmate  of  this  active  universe ! 

For  feeling  has  to  him  imparted  power 

That  through  the  growing  faculties  of  sense 

Dotli  like  an  agent  of  the  one  great  Mind 

Create,  creator  and  receiver  both, 

Working  but  in  alliance  with   the  works 

Which  it  beholds.  (II,  252-260) 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH 

clearlv 


357 
manifest  in 


a 


This  first  true,  spirit  of  man's  life ^ 

the  natural   rhil''l;  ir'   nbntfd   or   siipiM;esse(l   by   convention, 
"By  uniform  control  of  after  vears/'     The  loss  wliTcIriTt 
indicates  in   The  Prelude,  and  bemoans  in  the  Ode,  repre 
sents  a  true  experience  that  can  be  explained  by  modern    I 
psychology.     It  teaches  that  in  place  of  the  child's  indisj' 
criminate  observation,  the  man  tends  to  f(^calize  his  interest 
^"•"-TTTcTf^rfair)    dpfjn't^   1'"?? — Xhe   Ulan    therebv    loses 


^s    hiA 
^thaf 


childish  spontaneous   ioy  in  the  consciously  controlled 

fQrts__and  responses  of  maturity.     In  order,  therefore^ 

tTie  child  may  enjoy  his  heaven-sent  harmony  with  God's 
creation  as  tully  as  possible.   Wordsworth  would  elim ina te 

nrrn^tl    of    the    outside    iirterference of uistrnrtion    which 

talsely  goes   under   the  name__of  education.  ^     He   is   con- 
yinced  at  heart,  and  makesthe  point  again  and  again, 

How  little  those  formalities,  to  which 

With  overweening  trust  alone  we  give 

The  name  of  Education,  have  to  do 

With  real  feeling  and  jus't  sense.      (XIII,  169-172) 

His  philosophy  of  child  delight  and  happiness,  which  is 
essentially  that  of  Blake  also,  but  fully  and  consciously  de- 
veloped, is  explained  by  his  temperamental  love  and  ex- 
altation of  simple  dalesmen.  In  them  the  tutorings  of  na- 
ture, untrammeled  by  convention,  have  preserved  a  child- 
like spirit  of  love  and  reverence  for  natural  objects.  These 
are  the  teachings  of  The  Prelude. 


1  Corlpare  his  lines  on  Cambridge.   The  Prelude.  Bpok  II. 
591-608,  bi/t  especially: 

And  blind  Authority  beating  with  his  staff 

The  child   that  might  have   led   liim. 

f 


358  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

In  The  Excursion  (1815)  the  earlier,  supple,  naturalistic 
attitude,  still  close  to  Shaftesbury  and  Rousseau  in  spirit 
at  least,  has  lost  some  of  its  freshness  and  charm  in  the 
matter-of-fact  atmosphere  that  permeates  the  long  exposi- 
tory passages  on  questions  of  public  interest. 

Even  before  the  completion  of  The  Prelude,  at  the  time 
when  his  thoughts  were  occupied  with  recollections  of  his 
own  childhood,  he  often  assumed  a  didactic  manner  that  is 
remotely  suggestive  of  the  moral  tales.  The  didactic  Anec- 
dote for  Fathers  had  been  published  in  1798;  but  during 
the  year  1802,  when  he  composed  many  beautiful  lines  on 
childhood,  including  the  well-known  "Rainbow,"  he  also 
wrote  Foresight.  This  little  poem  is  delightfully  con- 
ceived, but  mechanically  expressed.  He  had  approached 
too  closely  to  the  bald  didacticism  of  the  moral-tale  writers 
to  follow  his  inspiration  freely.  The  subtitle,  "the  charge 
of  a  child  to  his  younger  companion,"  which  was  later  dis- 
carded, indicates  the  didactic  spirit  in  which  he  was  work- 
ing. The  subject  matter  is  botanical,  and  the  moral  smacks, 
if  not  of  what  Leigh  Hunt  called  "sordid  and  merely  plod- 
ding morals,"  of  the  thrift  and  reward  morality.  ^  It  dif- 
fers from  moral  tales  in  that  there  is  a  certain  indefinable 

'  Compare  Dorothy's  Loving  and  Liking   (1832)  : 
Yet,    listen,    Child — ^I    would    not    preach; 
But  only  give  some  plain  directions 
To  guide  your  speech  and  your  affections. 
See  also  The  Poet's  Dream  and  The  Longest  Day. 

Compare  To  a  Young  Lady  on  her  Birth-Day,  Being  the  First 
of  April,  anonymously  printed  in  A  Classical  Arrangement  of  Fu- 
gitive  Poetry,  vol.  XV,  p.  49 : 

Let  others  write  for  bye-designs, 

I  seek  some  moral  in  my  lines, 

Which  whosoever  reads  must  bear, 

Or   great,   or    learned,    or   young,    or    fair. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  359 

charm  in  the  dialogue  of  the  children  who  are  out  in  the 
fields  in  early  spring. 

W'ith  his  customary  dependence  on  Dorothy's  diary,  he 
capitalized  her  regret  over  having  plucked  a  strawberry- 
blossom  in  January.  He  was  stimulated  by  her  remark 
that  as  a  child  she  would  never  have  pulled  a  strawberry- 
blossom.  That  very  day  he  came  in  wi-th  the  poem,  known 
in  the  household  as  "Children  Gathering  Flowers."  The 
charge  of  the  elder  child  is  dramatically  conceived. 

That  is  a  work  of  waste  and  ruin — 

Do  as  Charles  and  I  are  doing! 

Strawberry-blossoms,  one  and  all. 

We    must    spare   them — 'here    are    many : 

Look  at  it — the  flower  is  small, 

Small  and  low,  though  fair  as  any. 

The  child's  insistence  on  the  difference  in  age  reveals 
Wordsworth's  ability  and  willingness  to  weave  a  common 
trait  of  child  nature  into  his  poem : 

Do    not   touch    it !    summers    two 
I  am  older,  Anne,  than  you. 

By  avoiding  the  negative  suggestion,  Wordsworth  con- 
ceived the  elder  child  as  a  true  monitor  who  centers  the 
younger  child's  attention  on  other  flowers. 

Pull  the  primrose,  sister  Anne! 

Pull  as  many  as  you  can. 

— Here  are  daisies,  take  your  fill; 

Pansies,  and  the  cuckoo-flower : 

Of  the  lofty  daffodil 

Make  your  bed,  or  make  your  bower; 

Fill    your    lap,   and    fill    your    bosom; 

Only    spare    the    strawberry-blos^m ! 

Then  he  enters  upon  a  train  of  thought  that  leads  to  the 
moral  of  the  poem. 


360  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

God  has  given  a  kindlier  power 

To    the    favoured    sitrawberrj^-flower. 

Hither  soon  as  spring  is  fled 

You  and  Charles  and  I  will  walk ; 

Lurking  berries,  ripe  and  red. 

Then  will  hang  on  every  stalk. 

Each  within  its  leafy  bower ; 

And  for  that  promise  spare  the  flower ! 

Nature  alone,  then,  is  not  sufficient.  Her  tutorings 
need  to  be  supplemented.  By  the  time  he  published  The 
Excursion,  he  had  awakened  to  the  need  of  popular  edu- 
cation. His  vision  of  a  system  of  state  education  for  chil- 
dren marks  him  as  a  pioneer  poet  among  those  men  of 
letters  who  appreciated  the  need  of  universal  education.  He 
appealed  to  church  and  state  to  realize  their  responsibilities 
in  the  education  of  children.  His  extended  notice  of  edu- 
cational problems,  and  the  obvious  sincerity  of  his  inten- 
tion, must  have  had  an  appreciable  effect  on  the  ever-widen- 
ing circle  of  his  readers. 

Elementary  education  in  England  was  dependent  upon 
local  initiative,  and  was  supplemented  by  the  philanthropical 
work  of  the  Society  for  the  Promotion  of  Christian  Knowl- 
edge, and  by  the  Sunday  School.  There  is  no  doubt  that 
these  efforts,  together  with  the  monitorial  systems  of  Lan- 
caster and  Bell,  paved  the  way  for  universal  education.  But 
the  state  had  uniformly  neglected  its  responsibilities,  and  it 
was  not  until  eighteen  years  after  Wordsworth  had  called 
attention  to  the  needs  of  elementary  education  that  the  first 
Parliamentary  grant  was  made  in  1833.  The  grant  of 
twenty  thousand  pounds,  designed  solely  to  aid  in  building 
schoolhouses,  had  to  be  passed  as  a  supply  bill,  which  was 
not  required  to  go  to  the  House  of  Lords,  where  as  pro- 
gressive legislation  it  would  have  been  killed. 


•     WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  361 

In  the  course  of  vital  discussion  wliich  is  recorded  in 
the  eig^hth  book  of  The  Excursion,  the  Wanderer  touched 
upon  the  failure  of  state  and  church  to  reahze  their  duties 
in  the  education  of  children.  Me  took  his  ilkistration  from 
the  Lake  District,  where  children  were  more  favorably 
situated  than  in  most  counties  of  Eng-land.  He  drew  an 
unpleasant  picture  of  the  stifif-legged,  awkward  ploughlx)y 
under  whose  shaggy  brow  are  set  sluggish  and  lustreless 
eyes 

Proclaiming  boldly  that  they  never  drew 

A  look  or  motion   of   intelligence 

From    infant-conning    of    the    Christ-cross-row, 

Or  puzzling  through  a  primer,  line  by  line, 

Till    perfect   mastery    crown    the   pains    at    last. 

{Excursion,  VIII,  411-415) 

The  state  had  neglected  him,  and  what  can  now  penetrate 
the  crust  in  which  his  soul  sleeps  "like  a  caterpillar  sheathed 
in  ice."  He  has  not  partaken  of  the  equal  rights  that  are 
boasted  in  his  country's  name.  These  lines  indicate  clearly 
that  Wordsworth  was  not  blinded  by  his  conception  of  an 
ideal  peasantry,  but  noticed  the  problem  of  popular  educa- 
tion as  faced  by  Hannah  More  in  the  dreadful  conditions  at 
rural  Cheddar. 

The  plight  of  children  was,  however,  worse  in  cities, 
where  an  inventive  age  had  converted  at  "social  Industry's 
command,"  peaceful  hamlets  or  tracts  of  wood  into  teem- 
insf  industrial  centers.  Here  the  abodes  of  men  are  irre- 
gularly  massed  as  thickly  as  trees  in  a  forest : 

crazy  huts 
And  tottering  hovels,  whence  do  issue  forth 
A  ragged  Offspring.  (VIII,  346-348) 

Here  the  "smoke  of  unremitting  fires  Hangs  permanent." 
Wordsworth  'writes  of  the  "defornnities  of  crowded  life." 
In  place  of  the  ancient,  peaceful  starry  night  that  gave  re- 


362  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

pose  to  man,  he  sees  an  "unnatural  light"  that  shines  from 
a  huge  many-windowed  factory  where  labor  never  ceases. 
In  place  of  the  curfew,  man  hears  the  harsh  bell  that 
punctually  calls  to  unceasing  toil.  As  the  day  laborers  are 
disgorged,  the  night  shift  enters  to  the  rumbling  sound  of 
''dizzy  wheels" : 

Men,    maidens,    youths, 
Mother    and    little    children,    boys    and    girls, 
Enter,  and  each  the  wonted  task  resumes 
Within  this  temple,  where  is  offered  up 
To  Gain,  the  master  idol  of  the  realm. 
Perpetual   sacrifice.  (VIII,    180-185) 

Wordsworth  does  not  rest  in  a  sentimental  contrast  be- 
tween the  worship  in  this  temple  and  that  of  his  ancestors  in 
vast  cathedral  or  conventual  church  where  tapers  burned 
day  and  night  in  honor  of  God  alone.  He  does  not  stop  with 
a  condemnation  of  the  profane  rites  at  the  altar  of  gain,  or 
the  desecration  of  streams  turned  into  ''instruments  of 
bane"  to  tempt  those  from  simplicity  whose  ancestors  drank 
pure  water  from  them.  IHe  turns  to  face  a  real  problem 
which  arose  with  the  factory  life  that  broke  up  the  home. 
In  the  neighborhood  of  factories,  homes  are  empty  from 
morning  to  evening. 

The  Mother  left  alone, — no  helping  hand 

To  rock  the  cradle  of  her  peevish  babe; 

No  daughters  round  her,  busy  at  the  wheel. 

Or  in  dispatch  of  each  day's  little  growth 

Of  household  occupation;  no  nice  arts 

Of  needle-work;  no  bustle  at  the  fire, 

Where    once    the    dinner    was    prepared    with    pride. 

(VIII,  267-273) 

Nothing  is  left  of  domestic  bliss  to  speed  the  day  or  cheer 
the  mind.  Wordsworth  has  phrased  here  an  outline  of  the 
problem  which  enlightened  men  and  women  are  still  hoping 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  363 

to  solve.  Wordsworth's  interest  is  altog-ether  focused  on 
children  who  are  deprived  of  their  birthright  because  econo- 
mists contend  that  the  state  thrives  by  child  labor  — '  an 
''unfeeling  thought."  ^  He  calls  the  doctrine  "false  as 
monstrous."  He  would  banish  wisdom  that  forces  upon  the 
child,  because  of  ''premature  necessity,"  work  that  shuts 
off  development  of  mind  and  heart,  and  makes  "its  very 
spring  a  season  of  decay"  by  "long  captivity"  and  "inward 
chains"  unworthy  of  a  native  Briton,  and  imposed  "with- 
out his  own  consent." 

In  Humanity  (1829)  Wordsworth  is  impatient  with 
those  who  defend  "qualified  oppression"  on  the  "hollow 
plea  of  recompense."     Such  arguments  are 

Fetched   with   cupidity   from  heartless   schools, 

That  to  an  Idol,  falsely  called  "the  Wealth 

Of  Nations,"  sacrifice  a  People's  health, 

Body  and  mind  and  soul ;  a  thirst  so  keen 

Is  ever  urging  on  the  vast  machine 

Of  sleepless  Labour,  'mid  whose  dizzy  wheels 

The  Power  least  prized  is  that  which  thinks  and  feels. 

Wordsworth  had  not  lost  his  early  enthusiasm,  and  ad- 
hered to  his  high  vision  for  the  welfare  of  man  as  the  in- 
heritor of  that  happiness  which  comes  only  through  living  in 
harmony  with  nature.  The  late  poem  To  the  Utilitarians 
(1833)  is  characterized  by  the  same  spirit  which  informs  his 
plea  for  imagination  in  the  education  and  reading  matter  of 
children. 

Avaunt  this  economic  rage! 
What  would  it  bring? — an   iron  age. 
Where  Fact  with  heartless  search  explored 
Shall  be  Imagination's  Lord, 

1  Compare  the  remark  imputed  to  Pitt,  who  is  said  to  have 
dismissed  a  delegation  of  complaining  factory  owners  with  the 
words,  "Take  the  children." 


364  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

And  sway  with  absolute  control 
The  god-like  Functions  of  the  Soul. 
Not  thus  can  knowledge  elevate 
Our  Nature  from  her  fallen  state. 
With  sober  Reason  Faith  unites 
To  vindicate  the  ideal  rights 
Of  human-kind — the  tone  agreeing 
Of  objects  with  internal  seeing. 
Of  efforts  with  the  end  of  Being. 

H'is  objection  is  not  to  industry  itself.  But  Wordsworth 
would  have  men  go  back  to  the  cottage  industry  which  kept 
children  affectionately  under  the  eye  of  parents.  The 
simple  life  of  cottagers  was  ever  in  his  thoughts.  From  his 
poetry  may  be  culled  passages  that  would  reconstruct  a 
complete  picture  of  spinning  and  weaving  in  the  cottage. 
The  Brothers  (1800)  provides  such  details: 

Upon  the  stone 
His  wife  sate  near  him,  teasing  matted  wool. 
While,  from  the  twin  cards  toothed  with  glittering  wire. 
He  fed  the  spindle  of  his  youngest  child. 
Who,  in  the  open  air,  with  due  accord 
Of  busy  hands  and  back-and-forward   steps. 
Her  large  round  wheel  was  turning.  1 

His  heart  is  in  the  lines  from  one  of  the  Lucy  poems  (1799)  : 

And  she  I  cherished  turned  her  wheel 
Beside  an  English  fire. 

This  attitude  lies  at  the  root  of  his  faith  in  the  simple  life 
as  the  hope  of  man.  Whenjie  observes  the  terrible^condi- 
tions  of  child  labor  at  industrial  centers,  he  cries  QtvL^-S.^JAl§L 
those  who  seek  to  justify  their  preference  for  tliesecondi- 
tions  inplace  of  the  traditional  home  industry  that  had  been 
carriecTonJii  a  hnppy  Fn^odgjir] 

1  Compare  The  Excursion  (Book  I,  1.  890)  :      'The  little  child 
who  sate  to  turn  the  wheel." 


\ 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  365 

The  Father,  if  perchance  he  still  retain 

His  old  employments,  goes  to  field  or  wood, 

No  longer  led  or  followed  by  the  Sons ; 

Idlers  perchance  they  were, — but  in  his  sight ; 

Breathing   fresh    air,   and    treading   the   green   earth; 

'Till  their  short  holiday  of  childhood  ceased, 

Ne'er  to  return !     That  birthright  now  is  lost. 

Economists  will  tell  you  that  the  State 

Thrives  by  the  forfeiture — unfeeling  thought. 

And   false   as  monstrous !      Can   the   mother  thrive 

By  the  destruction  of  her   innocent   sons 

In  whom  a  premature  necessity 

Blocks  out  the  forms  of  nature,  preconsumes 

The  reason,  famishes  the  heart,  shuts  up 

The  infant  Being  in  itself,  and  makes 

Its  very  spring  a  season  of  decay!  (VIII.  276-291) 

Wordsworth  was  justified  in  his  condemnation  of  in- 
dustrial abuses  involving  the  evils  of  child  labor.  The  First 
Factory  Act  of  1802,  the  "Health  and  Morals  of  Apprentice 
Act,"  was  designed  to  protect  children  who  were  herded 
into  woolen  mills.  ^  It  limited  work  to  twelve  hours  a  day, 
stipulated  that  night  work  was  to  cease  after  1804,  and  con- 
tained certain  provisions  about  elementary  education  in  the 
three  R's.  Whitewash  alone,  however,  would  not  atone  for 
unsanitary  conditions,  and  the  limitation  of  work  to  twelve 
hours  merely  reflects  the  terrible  conditions  under  which 
children  labored.  It  was  not  until  after  The  Excursion 
that  a  more  extensive  act  prohibited  employment  of  chil- 
dren under  nine.  This  act  again  justifies  Wordsworth's  de- 
nunciation of  conditions  as  they  existed  during  the  com- 
position of  The  Prelude  and  The  Excursion.  In  spite  of  the 
earlier  Act,  a  Royal  Commission  as  late  as  1833  foi-^nd  chil- 
dren working  fifteen  hours  a  day. 

1  The  word  cJiild  is  not  used  in  the  Act  of  1802;  it  does  appear 
in  the  Act  of  1833. 


366  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

James  Grahame's  The  Birds  of  Scotland  contains  affect- 
ing lines  on  the  abuse  of  children  in  industry.  Like  the 
benevolists,  he  pities  the  caged  bird,  and  in  a  sympathetic 
mood  recalls  that  the  bird's  fate  is  no  more  pitiable  than 
that  of  children  confined  in  factories.  If  Grahame  does  not 
express  himself  with  the  power  of  Wordsworth,  his  lines 
nevertheless  give  a  vivid  picture  of  what  one  of  Words- 
worth's contemporaries  saw  in  cities. 

Nor  is  thy  lot  more  hard  than  that  which  they 
(Poor  linnets!)  prove  in  many  a  storied  pile.  ^ 
They  see  the  light,  'tis  true  they  see,  and  know 
That  light  for  them  is  but  an  implement 
Of  toil.     In  summer  with  the  sun  they  rise 
To  toil :  nor  does  the  shortened  winter  day 
Their  toil  abridge :  for,  ere  the  cock's  first  crow, 
Aroused  to  toil,  they  lift  their  heavy  eyes. 
And  force  their  childish  limbs  to  rise  and  toil. 

Grahame  had   also  a   vision   of   traditional  home   industry, 
which  had  not  robbed  the  child  of  freedom. 

And  while  the  winter  night,  by  cottage  fire. 
Is  spent  in  homebred  industry,  relieved 
By  harmless  glee,  or  tale  of  witch,  or  ghost. 
So  dreadful  that  the  housewife's  listening  wheel 
Suspends  its  hum,  their  toil  protracted  lasts. 

No  joys,  no  sports  have  they:  what  little  time, 
The   fragment   of   an    hour,   can   be    retrenched 
From  labour,  is  devoted  to  a  shew, 
A  boasted  boon,  of  what  the  public  gives — 
Instruction.     Viewing  all  around  the  bliss 
Of  liberty,  they  feel  its  loss  the  more. 

Children  bound  to  industrial  slavery  see  birds  flitting  past 
the  factory  windows. 

But  no  sweet  note  by  them  is  heard,  all  lost. 
Extinguished    in   the   noise    that   ceaseless    stuns    the    ear. 

^  Cotton  factories. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  367 

As  with  Crabbe,  "stern  Truth"  led  Grahame  to  a  reah- 
zation  of  the  deg^radation  of  man  through  heartless  exploi- 
tation of  the  child.  Enamoured  of  the  beauty  of  nature  and 
the  joy  it  gives  man,  he  saw  nothing  but  vice  festering  in 
smoky  cities. 

If  such  be  the  effects  of  that  sad  system, 

Which,  in  the  face  of  nature's  law,  would  wring 

Gain  from  the  labouring  hands  of  playful  children; 

If   such    the  effects,   where   worth    and    sense   direct 

The  living,  intellectual  machines. 

What   must  not   follow,  when   the   power    is   lodged 

With  senseless,   sordid,   heartless  avarice? 

Wordsworth  held  that  wherever  the  boy  may  turn,  he 
is  still  a  prisoner  in  the  industrial  system,  and  can  not 
breathe  God's  free  air  that  ought  to  be  fanning  his  temples 
in  woods  and  by  the  side  of  streams. 

His  raiment,  whitened  o'er  with  cotton  flakes 
Or  locks  of  wool,  announces  whence  he  conies. 
Creeping  his  gait  and  cowering,  his  lip  pale, 
His  respiration  quick  and  audible.      (VIII.  309-312) 

State  and  church  have  neglected  their  duties  toward  the 
industrial  child  as  toward  the  ploughboy  of  remote  districts. 
The  poet  can  scarcely  fancy  that  a  gleam  could  break 
from  the  languid  eyes  of  the  factory  boy,  or  a  blush  mantle 
on  his  cheek.  This  is  not  the  human  being  who  in  child- 
hood should  enjoy  liberty  of  mind  and  body,  and  the  thrill 
of  vivid  physical  sensation  along  the  blood,  to  make  him 
"Sublime  from  present  purity  and  joy."  (Excursion  Ylll, 
320.)  What  can  the  state  hope  from  manhood  reared  on 
such  foundations?  The  Recluse  exclaims  that  there  is  no 
hope  for  such  children  or  for  tens  of  thousands  who  are  suf- 
fering a  wrong  as  deep.  From  such  as  these,  when  they 
have  been  discarded  by  the  factories,  are  recruited  the  abject 


368  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

human  shapes  who  in  rags  issue  from  tottering  hovels  or 
meet  the  traveler  on  the  skirts  of  furze-clad  commons  to 
whine  and  stretch  out  their  hands  for  coins  (VIII,  364). 

No  one  in  England  takes  delight  in  this  industrial  op- 
pression ;  the  bondage  goes  by  no  high-sounding  name.  Yet 
women  who  have  children  of  their  own,  behold  this  without 
compassion,  yea,  even  with  praise.  The  little  group  in  the 
parsonage  who  have  been  discussing  this  grave  problem, 
turn  their  thoughts  to  the  happier  theme  of  the  ''blooming 
boys"  who  come  from  a  fishing  expedition  after  having 
spent  a  few  short  hours  as  ''thriving  prisoners  of  the 
village-school."  (IX,  260.)  Their  lot  is  a  happy  one. 
When  they  are  grown  men  they  will  look  back  on  child- 
hood, and  say  that  justice  was  shown  them  "alike  to  body 
and  to  mind."  Then  Wordsworth  states  his  conception  of 
popular  education. 

O  for  the  coming  of  that  glorious  time 

When,  prizing  knowledge  as  her  noblest  wealth 

And  best  protection,  this  imperial  Realm, 

While  she  exacts  allegiance,  shall  admit 

An  obligation,  on  her  part,  to  teach 

Them  who  are  born  to  serve  her  and  obey; 

Binding  herself  by  statute  to  secure 

For  all   the   children   whom   her   soil   maintains 

The  rudiments  of  letters,  and  inform 

The  mind  with  moral  and  religious  truth, 

Both   understood    and   practised, — so    that   none. 

However  destitute,  be  left  to  droop 

By   timely   culture    unsustained.  (IX,   293-305) 

The  lisping  babe  proclaims  this  inherent  right  to  the  pro- 
tection of  its  innocence ;  and  the  rude  boy,  "having  overpast 
the  sinless  age,"  who  is  on  mischief  bent  and  turns  the  "god- 
like faculty  of  speech  To  impious  use,"  thereby  makes 
known  the  need  of  education.  It  is  fruitlessly  announced; 
but  it  mounts  like  a  prayer  "to  reach  the  State's  parental 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  369 

ear."     England  will  listen  to  the  i)rayer  if  she  is  not  un- 
feelingly devoid  of  a  mother's  heart. 

Wordsworth  then  phrases  a  message  to  be  heeded  in 
our  days  as  well  as  in  the  days  after  the  Revolution  and 
during  the  ferment  before  the  Reform  Bill.  As  he  looks 
abroad  on  the  continent  of  Europe,  he  sees  long-reverenced 
laws  and  customs  a'bolished,  and  territory  split  like  Polar 
fields  of  ice  rent  by  the  wind.  Discontent  takes  obnoxious 
shapes,  that  may  overthrow  law  and  order  even  in  "these 
fair  Isles."  With  keen  insight  he  observes  that  the  forces 
which  blindly  aim  to  subvert  institutions  would  be  thwarted 
if  ignorance  that  breeds  dark  discontent,  and  runs  into  wild 
disorder,  were  removed  by  education.  Education  is  no 
more  than  a  prudent  caution  which  requires  that  the  whole 
people  should  be  taught  and  trained  so  that  "black  resolve" 
niay  be  rooted  out,  and  virtuous  habits  take  its  place.  He 
has  faith  that  the  voice  of  English  lawgivers,  sounding 
"From  out  the  bosom  of  these  troubled  times,"  will  work 
this  general  good  and  that  England  will  "complete  her 
glorious  destiny."  In  those  days  she  will  behold  in  her- 
self "change  wide,  and  deep,  and  silently  performed,"  arising 

from  the  pains 
And    faithful   care   of   unambitious   schools 
Instructing    simple    childhood's    ready    ear. 

(TX.  394-396) 

Since  the  moral  crisis  which  had  swept  away  his  hopes 
for  a  regeneration  of  society  through  legislation,  he  had 
worked  gradually  toward  the  conception  which  sees  in  the 
education  of  the  child  the  hope  of  the  future.  In  the  high 
vision  of  a  society  humanised  the  world  over  through  edu- 
cation of  the  individual,  he  scornfully  brushes  aside  as 
groundless  the  gloomy  speculations  of  the  Malthusians,  who 
fear  overpopulation. 


370  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

With    such    foundations    laid,    avaunt    the    fear 
Of  numbers  crowded  on  their  native  soil, 
To  the  prevention  of  all  healthful  growth 
Through    mutual    injury!     Rather    in    the    law 
Of  increase  and  the  mandate  from  above 
Rejoice!  (IX,  363-368) 

At  the  same  time,  although  he  does  not  like  Berkeley  turn 
his  back  on  the  old  world,  Wordsworth  finds  that  the  new 
world  is  necessary  for  a  realization  of  his  ideal.  As  bees 
divide  in  swarming  time  and  find  a  new  abode,  so  English- 
men will  find  new  homes  beyond  the  seas. 

So  the  wide  waters,  open  to  the  power. 

The  will,  the  instincts,  and  appointed  needs 

Of  Britain,  do  invite  her  to  cast  off 

Her  swarms,  and  in  succession  send  them  forth ; 

Bound  to  establish  new  communities 

On  every  shore  whose  aspect  favours  hope 

Of  bold  adventure;  promising  to  skill 

And  perseverance  their  deserved  reward. 
* 

Earth's  universal  frame  shall  feel  the  effect; 

Even  till  the  smallest  habitable  rock. 

Beaten  by  lonely  billows,  hear  the  songs 

Of  humanised  society ;  and  bloom 

With  civil  arts,  that  shall  breathe   forth   their   fragrance, 

A   grateful   tribute   to   all-ruling   Heaven.      (IX,    375-391) 

On  the  highways  of  England,  Wordsworth  had  often 
observed  the  direct  evil  effects  of  child  labor.  It  is  an 
historical  fact  that  children,  because  of  their  size,  were 
peculiarly  adapted  for  work  at  certain  types  of  machines, 
so  that  the  tradition  of  child  labor  very  early  became  es- 
tablished. Ruthless  parish  officers,  against  whom  Lang- 
horne  and  Cowper  inveighed,  paid  manufacturers  five 
pounds  a  head  for  children  taken  off  their  hands,  to  be 
worked  from  the  age  of  five,  as  in  the  Stockport  hat  trade, 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  371 

fourteen  hours  in  the  twenty-four.  After  these  poor  children 
had  Hterally  outgrown  their  usefuhiess,  they  were  heartless- 
ly turned  loose  uix)n  the  community  without  having  learned 
a  useful  occupation.  Wordsworth  had  observed  the  effects 
of  this  method,  and  his  plan  for  universal  education  was  de- 
signed to  eliminate  the  helplessness  of  such  children,  who 
without  education  inevitably  became  beggars  or  criminals. 

like  the  vagrants  of  the  gipsy  tribe, 
These,    bred    to    little    pleasure    in    themselves, 
Are  profitless  to  others.  (VIII,  389-391) 

Three  poems  composed  in  1802  reflect  his  humanitarian 
interest  in  children  on  the  highways.  Beggars  and  its  se- 
quel are  delightful  literary  studies  of  vagrants ;  the  poems 
represent  careful  observation  of  the  rapidly  changing  moods 
of  children.  The  vitality  and  care-free  nature  of  these 
''joyous  vagrants"  who  in  the  "twinkling  of  an  eye"  could 
change  their  interest  from  butterflies  to  begging,  fascinated 
him.  Nevertheless  they  stirred  in  him  subtle  misgivings 
for  their  future.  They  met  him  in  a  genial  hour  when  all 
nature  breathed  happiness.  Therefore  his  pessimism  is 
tempered  with  a  sunny  optimism  that  struggles  to  give  him 
hope. 

Kind    Spirits!    may   we   not  believe 

That  they,  so  happy  and  so  fair 

Through    your    sweet    influence,    and    the    care 

Of  pitying  Heaven,  at  least  were  free 

From  touch  of  deadly  injury? 

Destined,  whate'er  their  earthly  doom. 

For  mercy  and  immortal  bloom  ? 

In  Sabbath  Walk,  Grahame  is  likewise  hopeful,  and 
breathes  prayers  of  thanks  because  toilers  in  factories  may 
on  the  Lord's  day  walk  by  thousands  in  fields  and  meadows. 
It  soothes  his  heart  to  see  children  of  toilworn  city  dwellers 


372  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

pull  promiscuously  weeds  and  flowers  which  ^'proudly"  in 
their  parent's  breast  "they  smiling  fix."  This  is  a  new  sit- 
uation in  English  poetry.  It  is  pleasant  to  come  upon  chil- 
dren of  the  industrial  class  at  play  in  the  open  fields,  and 
enjoying  what  poets  earlier  in  the  century  had  observed  only 
among  cottage  children  in  idyllic  surroundings.  Grahame's 
lines  ring  true  and  show  direct  observation  especially  in 
the  failure  of  city-bred  children  to  discriminate  between 
weed  and  flower. 

A  study  of  Wordsworth's  literary  treatment  of  the  hu- 
manitarian aspects  of  childhood  may  well  close  with  a  notice 
of  Alice  Fell;  or  Poverty  (1802),  which  is  important  also 
as  an  illustration  of  literary  tendencies.  In  earlier  poetry, 
especially  in  that  of  Swift,  Shenstone,  and  Cowper,  children 
are  found  jeering  in  chorus  at  travellers  on  the  highway. 
A  sound  with  a  different  import  followed  the  chaise  oc- 
cupied by  Mr.  Grahame  of  Glasgow,  brother  of  the  poet 
James  Grah^me.  The  incident  made  such  a  deep  impres- 
sion on  this  "man  of  ardent  humanity,"  who  was  a  helper 
of  Clarkson,  that  he  requested  Wordsworth  to  put  it  into 
verse  "for  humanity's  sake." 

Wordsworth  need  not  have  been  ashamed  of  the  simple 
ballad  of  a  child's  mishap  on  the  king's  highway.  It  would 
have  been  better  for  his  standing  as  a  poet  had  he  omitted 
Peter  Bell,  the  abuser  of  animals,  from  the  editions  of  1820 
to  1832.  The  simple  story  of  Alice  Fell,  the  orphan  girl, 
whose  cloak  had  been  .caught  in  the  wheel  of  Mr.  Grahame's 
chaise,  on  the  back  of  which  she  had  climbed,  must  have 
made  an  appeal  even  in  the  days  when  small  critics  were 
ridiculing  the  simplicity  of  Wordsworth's  verse.  His  sym- 
pathy is  clearly  with  the  sobbing  child  who  could  only  choke 
out  the  words  "my  cloak."  He  emphasizes  the  humanitarian 
traits  of  the  charitable  passengers :  they  left  sufficient  money 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  373 

with  the  innkeeper  to  buy  a  cloak  of  "duffil  .q:ray."  Words- 
worth was  attracted  to  the  child  who  could  not  be  consoled 
for  the  loss  of  her  coat ;  weatherbeaten  as  it  was,  it  had 
fended  her  ai^ainst  cold  and  rain.  A  child  under  such  cir- 
cumstances is  capable  of  but  one  thouf2:ht :  and  true  to 
child  nature,  Wordsworth  represents  her  as  unconsolable 
throughout  the  journey  to  Durham. 

Alk^^-E^ll  represents  the  extreme  rebound  from  the  gen- 
eralized attitude  towards  children.  It  is  a  detached  poem 
on  childhood,  and  \i  illustrates  the  fusion  of  concrete  in- 
dividuajizing  details  with  the  humanitarian  element.  His 
insistence  on  accuracy  of  detail  led  him  not  only  to  give  the 
child's  name,  but  also  to  identify  the  city  toward  which  she 
was  riding.  He  wrote  of  her  with  a  fine  feeling  that  infuses 
his  lines  with  the  warmth  and  glow  of  humanity.  The  in- 
sistence on  details  is  reflected  in  Lamb's  letter  written  at  the 
time  when  Wordsworth  was  thinking  of  revising  the  poem, 
possibly  with  an  eye  to  pleasing  his  critics:  "I  am  glad  that 
you  have  not  sacrificed  a  verse  to  those  scoundrels.  I  would 
not  have  had  you  ofifer  up  the  poorest  rag  that  lingered  upon 
the  stript  shoulders  of  little  Alice  Fell,  to  have  atoned  all 
their  malice ;  I  would  not  have  given  'em  a  red  cloak  to 
save  their  souls." 

Gay  wrote  with  artistic  detachment  about  slum  children  ; 
Blake  had  the  little  chimney  sweep  voice  a  bitter  protest 
against  social  conditions  that  oppressed  city  children  ;  Crabbe 
laid  bare  with  photographic  realism  the  environment  of 
children  in  filthy  hovels.  Wordsworth  conibined  all  these 
elements.  He  depicted  the  suffering  and  degradation  of 
children  in  industry ;  he  protested  against  the  philosophy 
which  sought  to  justify  child  labor;  in  concrete  details  he 
truthfully  and  convincingly  set  forth  the  conditions  against 
which   he   protested.     But   Wordsworth   added   an   element 


374  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

not  found  in  Gay,  Blake,  or  Crabbe.  He  incorporated  a 
definite  program  of  reform  that  is  more  liberal  than  that 
of  the  House  of  Indus/try.  With  deep  insight  into  the 
powers  of  nature  and  the  faculties  of  man,  he  offered 
practical  suggestions  for  a  measurable  realization  of  his 
dreams  of  a  happy  state  of  childhood.  His  faith  in  the 
sanctity  of  childhood,  and  his  unshakable  belief  in  the 
natural  right  of  every  child  to  enjoy  the  birthright  of  free- 
dom, led  him  to  a  solution  that  is  still  being  tested  in  the 
common  schools  of  England  and  America. 

IV 

Wordsworth's  most  exalted  conception  of  childhood  is 
found  in  the  Ode  Intunations  of  Immortality  from  Recollec- 
tions of  Early  Childhood  (1803-1806).  The  Ode  is  the 
glory  of  his  poetry.  It  is  also  the  crown  of  one  hundred 
years  of  poetic  treatment  of  childhood.  He  wrote  of  his  con 
templated  master  poem,  which  was  never  completed,  and  of 
which  The  Prelude  and  The  Excursion  form  only  a  part,  in 
terms  of  a  cathedral,  in  relation  to  which  his  shorter  poems 
stand  as  chantries  and  chapels.  In  this  conception  the  in- 
comparable Ode  is  worthy  of  the  position  of  the  Lady 
Chapel.  Professor  Knight,  who  took  the  poem  out  of  its 
chronological  position  and  placed  it  at  the  close  of  Words- 
worth's collected  works,  considered  it  "the  greatest  of 
Wordsworth's  poems,  and  that  to  which  all  others  lead  up." 

The  Ode  is  the  summation  not  only  of  Wordsworth's 
philosophy  (which  found  its  base  in  childhood),  but  also  of 
the  attitude  toward  childhood  reflected  in  those  poets  of  the 
eighteenth  century  who  have  been  noticed  in  this  study.  It 
is  a  final  complete  expression  of  the  essence  of  those  phases 
which  are  vital  to  the  naturalistic  interpretation.  It  is  the 
natural   and   inevitable   outsrrowth   of   tendencies   that   had 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH       \  377 

become  focused  in  Wordsworth  during^  the\  P^      v 

the   Ode   was   composed,     h   reveals 
richest  expressjgn  of  Wordsworth's   faith 
puritv^f  the  rhilH's  intuitions. 

The  first  four  stanzas  were  composed  in  \_--j,  and  the 
remainder  of  the  poem  perhaps  just  before  or  immediately 
after  the  completion  of  The  Prelude.  Wordsworth  wrote, 
"Two  years  at  least  passed  between  the  writing  of  the  first 
four  stanzas  and  the  remaining  part."  It  was  completed  in 
1806  and  published  in  1807.  The  Ode  was  conceived,  then, 
in  those  years  when  his  mind  was  occupied  with  recollec- 
tion of  his  childhood  during  the  composition  of  his  auto- 
biographical poem. 

There  were  certain  events  of  a  domestic  nature  which  al- 
so centered  his  attention  on  childhood  and  immortality  at  this 
time.  During  the  month  of  August,  1802,  William  and 
Dorothy  visited  Calais,  where  he  walked  on  Calais  sands 
with  his  daughter,  who  is  the  child  of  the  sonnet,  "It  is  a 
beauteous  evening,  calm  and  free."  The  concluding  lines 
state  his  faith  in  the  divine  element  in  children : 

Dear  Child!   dear  Girl!  that  walkest  with  me  here. 
If  thou  appear  untouched  by  solemn  thought, 
Thy  nature  is  not  therefore  less  divine : 
Thou  liest  in  Abraham's  bosom  all  the  year ; 
And  worshipp'st  at  the  Temple's  inner  shrine, 
God  being  with  thee  when  we  know  it  not. 

In  October,  1802,  Mary  Hutchinson,  with  whom  he  had 
attended  Anne  Birkett's  infant  school  at  Penrith  in  1777, 
became  his  wife.  In  1803,  the  year  in  which  the  Ode  was 
begun,  his  son  John  was  born ;  and  in  1804  his  daughter 
Dora.  In  February,  1805,  his  favorite  brother  John  lost 
his  life  in  the  wreck  of  his  ship.  The  poet's  thoughts  had 
since  1798  been  occupied  with  childhood  in  relation  to  the 
soul  life  of  man,  and  the  death  of  his  brother,  whose  loss 


374  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

iHOved  him  deeply,  centered  his  thoughts  on  the  problem  of 
immortality.  The  first  four  stanzas  (1803)  of  the  Ode  are 
in  the  mood  of  The  Prelude.  -When  he  took  up  the  Ode 
again  in  1805,  he  began  with  the  well-known  fifth  stanza 
which  adds  the  element  not  to  be  found  in  eighteenth-cen- 
tury poetry  on  the  recollection  of  early  childhood.  He 
explains  the  divinity  of jchildhood  by  proclaiming  the  con- 
tmuitj^_of_  existencjA  Wordsworth  more  than  halT'be- 
lieved  in  this  in  spite  of  his  palliative  remarks  addressed  to 
orthodox  readers  in  the  Fenwick  note:  '*But  let  us  bear  in 
mind  that,  though  the  idea  is  not  advanced  in  revelation, 
there  is  nothing  there  to  contradict  it,  and  the  fall  of  man 
presents  an  analogy  in  its  favour.  Accordingly,  a  pre- 
existent  state  has  entered  into  the  popular  creeds  of  many 
nations." 
r^  In  view  of  his  hi^^onception  of  the  natural  rights  of 
I  children  and  the  glory  of  childhood,  it  is  not  surprising^at 
\  Wordsworth  should  have  looked  upon  the  child  as  an  oracle 
J  of  God  newly  c"omFTfomrhis  maker.  It  was  in  fact  in- 
""evitable  that  he  should  do  this,  for  to  postulate  a  previous 
state  of  existence  is  but  to  carry  one  step  farther  the  affec- 
tionate recollection  of  childhood  in  native  fields.  In  The 
Prelude  and  The  Excursion  he  holds  in  the  main  to  the  child 
living  among  men,  and  makes  a  plea  for  the  natural  rights 
of  the  child.  In  the  Ode  he  gives  an  interpretation  of  those 
powers  upon  which  the  naturalistic  conception  may  be  based. 
He  answers  the  question,  'Why  is  the  child  capable  of 
greater  joy  than  man,  and  why  should  man  reverence  chi|d^_ 

1  Although  Beattie  has  written  beautiful  lines  on  the  innocence 
and  purity  of  children,  he  seems  to  have   had  no   idea  of  a  pre- 
existent  state.     In  the  Ode  to  Hope  he  writes : 
When  first  on  Childhood's  eager  gaze 
Life's   varied    landscape,    stretched    immense    around, 
Starts  out  of  night  profound. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  377 

Jiood^'  In  the  course  of  his  solution  of  this  mystery,  Words- 
worth has  touched  upon  every  motive  of  the  theme  of  child- 
hood noticed  during  the  previous  century.  His  solution  may 
have  been  suggested  by  Platonic  philosophy  or  by  Vaughan/ 
Whatever  the  source  of  his  inspiration,  it  was  inevitable  in 
the  development  of  the  naturalistic  conception  of  innate 
goodness,  that  a  poet  should  face  the  problem  of  finding  the 
reason  for  the  greater  purity  and  happiness  of  children. _^ 

The  earliest  poetry  in  the  tradition  that  leads  to  the  Ode, 
reveals  how  the  poet  turned  instinctively  to  cottage  children. 
Thomas  Warton  had  pictured  in  The  Hamlet  a  sunny  land- 
scape peopled  by  care-free  cottage  children.  Akenside  and 
Bruce  affectionately  recalled  their  own  childhood  in  the 
presence  of  nature ;  and  in  the  revised  version  of  his  poem, 
Akenside  is  definitely  suggestive  of  the  cadence  and  rhythm 

1  Plato's  Phaedo  and  Phaedrus,  Henry  Vaughan's  The  Re- 
treate,  Corruption,  and  The  World,  and  Thomas  Traherne's  Wonder, 
oflFer  parallels  to  Wordsworth's  Ode  in  so  far  as  they  also  adopt 
the  doctrine  of  pre-existence.  There  are,  however,  in  each  instance, 
differences  in  application.  An  eighteenth -century  anonymous  poem 
Pre-Existence  A  Poem  in  Imitation  of  Milton  refers  to  the  Platonic 
conception  of  ideas.  With  Spenser's  description  of  the  "Garden  of 
Adonis"  in  the  Faerie  Queene  Wordsworth  must  have  been  familiar, 
as  he  and  Dorothy  were  persistent  readers  of  Spenser.  Professor 
E.  Hershey  Sneath  states  that  the  reference  to  Plato  in  the  Fenwick 
note  "hardly  warrants  us  in  saying  that  he  borrowed  his  doctrine 
from  Plato.  The  roots  of  the  Poet's  conviction  seem  to  have  been 
imbedded  in  the  subsoil  of  his  trance-experiences  of  childhood, 
which  gave  him  the  consciousness  of  a  world  above,  and  more  real 
than  the  natural  world  of  sense  ...  in  trying  to  interpret  this 
experience  to  himself,  and  then  to  others,  so  far  as  it  related  to 
pre-existence.  he  found  his  conviction  sanctioned  by  Plato.  But 
the  conviction  itself  appears  ultimately  to  have  had  its  origin  in 
these  unique  experiences  of  childhood  and  youth." — Wordsworth, 
Poet  of  Nature  and  Poet  of  Man,  by  E.  Hershey  Sneath,  Ginn  and 
Company,  1912,  p.  217. 


378  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

of  Wordsworth's  most  exalted  recollections  of  a  childhood 
influenced   by   mountains,   forests,   and   streams.     Beattie's 
Minstrel  in  the  same  decade  depicts  an  individual  child  who 
responds   sensitively   to   subtle  influences   emanating   from 
external   nature.     In   fact,   Dorothy   recognized   points   of 
likeness    between    Beattie's    ideal    "natural"   boy    and    her 
brother  William.     Whether  in  the  person  of  a  Lavina  or 
Edwin,  or  in  the  childhood  of  Bruce  or  Akenside,  the  child 
is  at  the  center  of  naturalistic  poetry.     Naturalistic  poetry 
reversed  the  methods  of  poets  like  Prior,  who  in  their  pre- 
occupation with  the  institutional  child  looked  forward  im- 
patiently to  manhood  or  womanhood.     The  romantic  pOBts,l 
irTplace  of  lookmglo  man  for  a  realization  of  iheir  hopes  J 
asked  man  to  look  back  to  childhood  as  the  ideal  state:  tol 
realize  his  highest  hopes,  man  must  becorne  again  a  chlldj 
The  element  which  stimulated  poets  to  a  new  interest  m 
children,  and  which  added  novelty  to  the  mystical  exaltation 
of  the  child  by  Christ,  they  found  in  Shaftesbury's  philo- 
sophy that  identified  the  good  and  the  beautiful. 

They  did  not  feel  it  necessary  to  go  to  the  noble  savage  to 
find  natural  instincts  expressed  with  primitive  clearness; 
here  was  the  child  fresh  from  the  hands  of  nature,  and 
livin^jnstinctively  in  harmony  with  the  laws^  gf  n?^tiir^. 
Bruce,  Akenside,  and  Lovibond  not  only  lovingly  recalled 
childhood  as  the  beautiful  season  of  life,  when  God  was  im- 
manent and  the  sole  guiding  force,  but  Lovibond  exalted  the 
child  by  holding  him  up  as  a  model  for  men  in  their  relation 
to  created  beings  in  the  realm  of  external  nature.  In  their 
childhood,  and  then  only,  these  poets  had  been  in  full  har- 
mony with  the  spirit  of  love,  which  permeates  the  universe, 
and  for  a  recognition  of  which  Langhorne  pleaded  in  The 
Country- Justice.  The  days  of  childhood  not  only  were 
those  of  true  happiness,  but  it  was  then  that  ''Life's  morning 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  379 

radiance  had  not  left  the  hills" ;  it  was  in  those  early  years 
of  simple  childhood  that  "Nature  and  those  rustic  powers" 
revealed  a  ''light"  that  is  seldom  beheld  by  the  grown  man. 
Like  Blake,  the  poets  of  this  school  scorned  unaided 
reason,  not  like  Keats  on  purely  esthetic  grounds,  but  be- 
cause reason  alone  will  not  help  man  to  penetrate  the  mys- 
teries of  life.  These  are  revealed,  in  their  estimation,  most 
fully  in  the  primitive  intuitions  of  the  child,  because  he  is 
closest  to  his  maker.  Wordsworth  expresses  this  in  his 
sonnet  to  Mrs.  Southey   (Miscellaneous  Sonnets,  XXXVT, 

1837)  : 

delegated  Spirits  comfort  fetch 
To  Her  from  heights  that  Reason  may  not  win. 
Like  Children,  She  is  privileged  to  hold 
Divine  Communion ;  both  do  live  and  move, 
Whate'er   to   shallov^r   Faith   their   ways   unfold, 
Inly  illumined  by  Heaven's  pitying  love. 

But  this  spirit  of  love,  manifest  in  the  child,  is  soon  lost 
in  the  man : 

Love   pitying   innocence,   not   long   to   last, 
In  them. 

Wordsworth  is  not  toying  in  the  Ode.  He  crystallizes 
the  conception  of  the  poets  before  his  time  by  speaking  of 
childhood  in  terms  of  faith  and  religion.  In  this  way  he 
interprets  the  reverence  for  childhood  implied  in  the  natural- 
istic attitude.  The  earlier  poets  emphasize  the  cares 
glooms  of  age.  Wordsworth,  however,  is  interested  in 
survives  in  man  from  his  childhood.  In  one  ot  his 
highly  inspired  poemy,"nTe'~evening  voluntary  Composed 
Upon  an  Evening  of  Extraordinary  Splendour  and  Beauty 
(1818),  he  is  stirred  with  the  fervor  characteristic  of  his 
earlier  effusions.  Once  again  he  writes  of  common  ob- 
jects in  a  strain  of  exalted  emotion  that  recalls  the  mood  of 
Tintern  Abbey  and  the  Ode  itself. 


380  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Such  hues  from  their  celestial  Um 

Were  wont  to  stream  before  mine  eye, 

Where'er  it  wandered  in  the  morn 

Of  blissful  infancy. 

This  glimpse  of  gbj:K..j!diy_^l£n£wed  ? 

Nay,  rather  speak  with  gratitude; 

For,  if  a  vestige  of  those  gleams 

Survived,  'twas  only  in  my  dreams. 

Dread  Power !  whom  peace  and  calmness  serve 

No  less  than  Nature's  threatening  voice, 

If  aught  unworthy  be  my  choice, 

From  THEE  if  I  would  swerve; 

Oh,  let  Thy  grace  remind  me  of  the  light 

Full  early  lost,  and  fruitlessly  deplored; 

Which,   at   this    moment,   on   my   waking    sight 

Appears  to  shine,  by  miracle  restored; 

My  soul,  though  yet  confined  to  earth, 

Rejoices  in  a  second  birth! 

He  is  here  thinking  of  those  "first-born  aflfections"  that  are 
clearly  evident  in  the  "gleams"  vouchsafed  to  the  child  but 
lost  to  the  man.     In  Matertval  Grief  (1810)  he  writes: 

The  Child  she  mourned  had  overstepped  the  pale 

Of  Infancy,  but  still  did  breathe  the  air 

That  sanctifies  its  confines,  and  partook 

Reflected  beams  of  that  celestial  light 

To  all  the  Little-ones  on  sinful  earth 

Not  unvouchsafed — a  light  that  warmed  and  cheered 

Those  several  qualities  of  heart  and  mind 

Which,  in  her  own  blest  nature,  rooted  deep, 

Daily  before  the  Mother's  watchful  eye. 

And  not  hers  only,  their  peculiar  charms 

Unfolded. 

Wordsworth's  high  seriousness  has  transmuted  the 
cruder  ore  of  the  eighteenth  century.  While  writing  of 
the  soul  in  Night  Thoughts  (Book  VI),  Young,  whose  ar- 
gument leads  him  to  despise  life,  could  only  see  in  the  "tow- 
ering talents,  and  terrestrial  aims"  of  a  genius, 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  381 

as   thrown    from   her   high    sphere, 
The  glorious  fragments  of  a  soul  immortal, 
With   rubbish   mixt,   and  glittering  in   the  dust. 

Mackenzie  exalted  childhood  in  Pursuits  of  Happiness: 

See  fresh  from  nature's  hand,  unfettered  youth. 

But  he  was  able  to  express  his  sense  of  loss  only  in  the  con- 
ventional manner : 

But  soon,  too  soon,  the  airy  fabrics  fall, 
And   servile  Reason  lacqueys   Interest's   call : 
Now    Caution    creeps   where   Virtue    stalked    before, 
And  cons  the  battered  page  of  Prudence  o'er. 

The  following  lines  from  Beattie's  Ode  to  Hope  are 
typical  of  the  best  expression  given  before  Wordsworth  to 
the  sense  of  something  lost : 

Ye  days,  that  balmy  influence  shed, 

When   sweet  childhood,  ever  sprightly, 

In  paths  of  pleasure  sported  lightly. 

Whither,  ah,  whither,  are  ye  fled? 

Ye  cherub  train,  that  brought  him  on  his  way, 

O,  leave  him  not  midst  tumult  and  dismay. 

In  his  indomitable  optimism,  Thomson,  although  ex- 
ternal, is  close  to  Wordsworth.  Thomson  realizes  a  diflfer- 
ence  between  age  and  youth,  but  is  not  moved  to  melancholy 
musings : 

Bid  the  morn  of  youth 

Rise  to  new  light,  and  beam  afresh  the  days 

Of  innocence,  simplicity,  and  truth ; 

To    cares    estranged,    and    manhood's    thorny    ways: 

What  transport,  to  retrace  our  boyish  plays. 

Our  easy  bliss,  when  each  thing  joy  supplied; 

The  woods,  the  mountains,  and  the  warbling  maze 

Of  the  wild  brooks!        (Castle  of  Indolence,  Canto  I) 

Gray's  recollection  of  his  boyhood  days  at  Eton  is  at 
times  premonitory  of  the  Ode  in  mood  and  phrasing,  al- 


382  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

though  Gray  like  other  eighteenth-century  poets  is  not  con- 
cerned in  the  same  sense  as  Wordsworth  with  the  spiritual 
relationship  between  child  and  nature. 

Ah  happy  hills,  ah  pleasing  shade, 

Ah  fields  beloved  in  vain, 
Where  once  my  careless  childhood  strayed, 

A  stranger  yet  to  pain ! 
I  feel  the  gales,  that  from  ye  blow, 
A  momentary  bliss  bestow. 

As  waving  fresh  their  gladsome  wing 
My  weary  soul  they  seem  to  soothe, 
And  redolent  of  joy  and  youth, 

To  breathe  a  second  spring. 

If  certain  similarities  are  evident,  the  differences  are 
also  obvious.  The  earlier  poets  felt  the  emotion  which 
prompted  Wordsworth,  but  they  are  less  sure  and  power- 
ful in  expression  because  they  hold  to  physical  aspects. 
The  mood,  moreover,  has  not  been  correlated  with  all  the 
experiences  of  the  poet's  life.  Wordsworth's  highly  de- 
veloped local  feeling,  which  was  physical  at  bottom  to  be 
sure,  and  which  attached  itself  to  objects  familiar  from  in- 
fancy, served,  nevertheless,  frequently  to  stir  recollections 
of  a  subtler  nature.  As  a  result,  the  backward  look  is  the 
mainspring  of  his  poetic  activities ;  recollection  lies  at  the 
root  of  his  being.  When  expounding  his  philosophy  of 
the  simple  life,  he  is  sooner  or  later  sure  to  anchor  his  most 
inspired  thoughts  in  childhood,  and  especially  in  the  spiritual 
gleam  that  came  to  the  child  in  the  moments  of  his  most 
intense  delight  in  nature. 

He  was  fully  conscious  of  the  important  place  he  had 
assigned  to  the  child  as  the  chief  factor  in  his  carefully 
wrought  philosophy.  In  the  twelfth  book  of  The  Prelude 
he  exclaims : 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  383 

Oh  '    myst(^j-v   nf   nit^n,    frr>m    wV\^\   3    Hepth 

Proceed  thv  honours.      I  am  lost,  but  see 

Tn  simple  childhood  somethipgr  r>f  th^  h^«^ 

On    wViirh    tViy    gr^atn<^<;t;    <^|^nH«; 

The  days  gone  by 
Return  upon  me  almost  from  the  dawn 
Of  life:  The  hiding-places  of  man's  power 
Open.  (XII,    272-280) 

The  earlier  poets  have  not  expressed  themselves  with  the 
same  fullness,  because,  being  precursors  of  Blake  and 
Wordsworth,  they  did  not  realize  all  the  implications  of 
their  attitude  toward  childhood.  Wordsworth,  on  the  other 
hand,  had  deliberately  and  by  gradual  stages  evolved  a  phi- 
losophy in  which  childhood  is  the  fundamental  consideration. 
His  lines  reveal  the  power  which  comes  with  a  full  reali- 
zation that  the  child  is  at  the  center  of  his  philosophy.  ^  In 
The  Prelude  he  has  written  of  childhood  in  terms  of  sanc- 
tification : 

Our  childhood  sits, 

Our  simple  childhood,   sits  upon  a  throne 

That   hath   more   power  than   all   the   elements. 

I  guess  not  what  this  tells  of  Being  past, 

Nor  what  it  augurs  of  the  life  to  come; 

But  so  it  is.  (V,  507-512) 

He  employs  the  language  of  religion  to  reflect  the  sacred- 
ness  of  childhood. 

Do  w^ revert  so  fondh/_to.lbe  walks.- 


Of  childhood^but  that  there  the  Soul  discerns 
1  he  gear  memorial  footsteps  unimpaired 

^Wordsworth,  according  to  the  Wordsworth  Con-cordance, 
has  used  the  following  words  in  their  different  forms:  child,  over 
four  hundred  times;  babe  and  baby,  over  one  hundred  times;  infant, 
over  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  times;  girl,  fifty  times;  and  boy, 
over  two  hundred  and  fifty  times. 


384  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Of  her  own  native  vigour;  thence  can  hear 
Reverberations ;  and  a  choral  song, 
Commingling  with  the  incense  that  ascends, 
Undaunted,   toward   the   imperishable  heavens. 
From  her  own  lonely  altar?      {Excursion,  IX,  36-44^) 

Although  specific  indebtedness  is  not  "meant  to^  sug- 
gested, the  extent  to  which  Wordsworth  is  the  recipient  of 
influences  at  work  for  a  century  is  evident  in  the  way  the 
Ode  brings  together  and  fuses  into  one  majestic  conception 
of  childhood  the  vocabulary  and  imagery  which  may  be 
found  scattered  throughout  eighteenth-century  poetry  deal- 
ing with  childhood.  Where  parallels  exist  he  has  converted 
the  earlier  imagery  into  something  rich  and  strange.  Where 
poets  had  often  inclined  to  matter-of-fact  statement, 
Wordsworth's  lines  reveal  power  and  beauty  that  come  only 
with  imaginative  realization.  (The  transmutation  is  like 
that  in  the  closing  lines  of  the  beautiful  tribute  To  a  Yoking 
Lady.  In  prose  and  poetry  of  the  eighteenth  century  there 
are  innumerable  references  to  Lapland,  which  seems  to 
have  had  a  fascination  for  the  age ;  but  the  references  with 
which  Wordsworth  must  have  been  familiar  from  his  read- 
ing are  colorless  and  uninspired.  With  a  master  poet's 
sure  sense  of  values  he  penetrates  to  the  innermost  beauty  of 
the  reference  and  emotionally  fuses  it  with  his  promises  for 
the  old  age  of  a  mother  of  children: 

an  old  age  serene  and  bright, 
And  lovely  as  a  Lapland  night, 
Shall  lead  thee  to  thy  grave. 

Although  the  poem  Pre-Existence  (A  Poem  in  Imitation 
of  Milton)  does  not  touch  upon  childhood,  it  is  important 
as  constituting  a  poss-ible  link  between  Wordsworth's  in- 
terest in  childhood  and  his  doctrine  of  a  pre-existent  state. 
Wordsworth  was  well  read  in  the  poetry  of  the  eighteenth 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  385 

century,  and   it  is  not  at  all   improbable   that  he   was  ac- 
quainted with  this  poem.  ^ 

Pre-Existence  recognizes  a  previous  life  of  the  soul. 
The  anonymous  poet  changed  the  Miltonic  conception  so 
that  the  fallen  angels  are  permanently  enclosed  in  Hell. 
God  passed  judgment  also  on  angels  who,  though  they  had 
joined  in  sedition,  had  since  sued  for  "clemency  and  grace." 
These  angels  were  condemned  to  live  as  human  beings  on 
the  earth,  where  they  are  not,  however,  allowed  to  possess 
the  faculties  of  their  divine  state.  Beneath  chaos  sits  Silence, 
from  an  urn  in  whose  hands  flows  Lethe. 

Hither  compelled,    each    soul    must    drink    long   draughts 

Of  those  forgetful  streams,  till  forms  within. 

And  all  the  great  ideas  fade  and  die : 

For  if  vast  thought  should  play  about  a  mind 

Inclosed  in  flesh,  and  dragging  cumbrous  life. 

Fluttering  and  beating  in  the  mournful  cage. 

It  soon  would  break  its  gates  and  wing  away : 

Tis  therefore  my  decree,  the  soul  return 

Naked  from  off  this  beach,  and  perfect  blank,  2 

To  visit  the  new  world ;  and  straight  to  feel 

Itself,  in  crude  consistence  closely  shut. 

The   dreadful   monument  of  just   revenge; 

Immured  by  heaven's  own  hand,  and  placed  erect 

On  fleeting  matter,  all  imprisoned  round 

With  walls  of  clay :  th'  aetherial  mould  shall  bear 

The  chain  of  members,  deafened  with  an  ear, 

Blinded  by  eyes,  and  manacled  in  hands. 

Here  anger,  vast  ambition,  and  disdain. 

And  all  the  haughty  movemen<§,  rise  and  fall, 

As  storms  of  neighboring  atoms  tear  the  soul ; 

1  Wordsworth    owned    a    set    of    Bell's    volumes    of    collected 
poetry. 

2  Wordsworth  protests  against  this  view  in  the  Ode. 


386  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

And  hope,  and  love,  and  all  the  calmer  turns 
Of  easy  hours,  in  their  gay  gilded  shapes, 
With  sudden  run,  skim  o'er  deluded  minds, 
As  matter  leads  the  dance.  .    .    . 

As  men  they  will  vainly  strive  to  appease  their  longings,  be- 
cause their  souls  will  not  be  free 

till  all  in  death 
Shall   vanish,    and   the   prisoner,   now   enlarged, 
Regains  the  flaming  borders  of  the  sky. 

It  seems,  however,  that  the  poet  has  allowed  an  obscure 
sense  of  a  higher  life  to  Hnger,  but  only  as  a  torment  to 
the  clay-enclosed  soul. 

JUDGMENT,  blinded  by  delusive  SENSE, 

Contracted  through  the  cranny  of  an  eye, 

Shoots  up  faint  languid  beams,  to  that  dark  seat. 

Wherein  the  soul,  bereaved  of  native  fire, 

Sits  intricate,  in  misty  clouds  obscured. 

Even  from  itself  concealed,  and  there  presides 

O'er  jarring  images  with  Reason's  sway, 

Which  by  his  ordering  more  confounds  their  form   .    .    . 

The  more  he  strives  t'  appease,  the  more  he  feels 

The  struggling  surges  of  the  darksome  void 

Impetuous,  and  the  thick  revolving  thoughts 

Encountering  thoughts,  image  on  image  turned, 

A  Chaos  of  wild  silence,  where  sometimes 

The  clashing  notions  strike  out  casual  light. 

Which  soon  must  perish  and  be  lost  again 

In  the  thick  darkness  round  it.     Now,  he  tries 

With  all  his  might  to  raise  some  weighty  thought. 

Of  me,  of  fate,  or  of  th'  eternal  round, 

Which  but  recoils  to  crush  the  labouring  mind. 

High  are  his  reasonings,  but  the  feeble  clue 

Of  fleeting  images  he  draws  in  vain.   .    .    . 

Poems  on  outdoor  play  and  native  fields  are  in  the  direct 
line  of  development  that  leads  to  the  Ode.  But  suggestions 
for  the  thought  of  the  first  four  stanzas  of  the  Ode,  and  for 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  387 

the  phraseolog"y  of  all  of  it,  are  also  to  be  found  in  ix)ems  on 
the  subject  of  immortality.  Wordsworth  must  have  been 
familiar  with  Prior's  Solomon,  in  the  third  book  of  which 
Prior  brings  together  thoughts  of  childhood  and  immortal- 
ity; with  Young's  Night  Thoughts;  with  Isaac  Hawkins 
Browne's  De  Aninii  Immo-rtalitate  (1759),  translated  by 
numerous  versifiers,  and  especially  by  Soame  Jenyns ;  and 
with  Thomas  Denton's  Immortality.  Similarity  is  often 
striking  in  lines  on  outdoor  play  and  native  fields.  The 
difference,  however,  between  poetry  and  versifying  is  more 
obvious  in  those  poems  that  develop  the  theme  of  immor- 
tality. Denton,  for  instance,  speaks  of  the  rainbow  as 
"moon-sprung  Iris"  and  ''roscid  bow,"  and  of  the  soul  as 
"The  ray  divine,  the  pure  ethereal  mate,"  and  in  phrasing  the 
specifically  childhood  element  can  not  get  beyond  "prattling 
childhood  lisps  with  mimick  air." 

Yet  certain  lines  in  Denton's  poem  contain  hints  and 
sometimes  definite  suggestions  that  provide  parallels  for 
certain  details  in  Wordsworth's  development  in  the  Ode. 
Denton  seems  to  have  had  an  inkling  that  the  vital  spirit, 
unlike  the  body  which  is  subject  to  decay,  is  not  limited  to  a 
terrestrial  and  a  future  life.  In  making  out  a  case  for  im- 
mortality after  death,  he  looks  back  to  man's  hour  of  birth, 
at  which  time  the  vital  spirit  is  not  so  much  born  as  re- 
awakened. He  does  not  definitely  postulate  a  pre-existent 
state;  but  he  does  seem  to  suggest  that  birth  is  not  alto- 
gether the  beginning  of  the  vital  principle  which  animates 
the  human  clay. 

As  when  Lucina  ends  the  pangful  strife. 

Lifts  the  young  babe,  and  lights  her  lambent  flame, 
Some  powers  new-waking  hail  the  dawning  life, 

Some  unsuspended  live,  unchanged,  the  same ; 
So  from  our  dust  fresh  faculties  may  bloom, 
Some  posthumous  survive,  and  triumph  o'er  the  tomb. 


388  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Wordsworth  makes  this  precise  and  definite,  clothes  it  in 
appropriate  imagery  in  the  lines  beginning  "The  Soul  that 
rises  with  us,"  and  changes  the  emphasis  by  focusing  the 
whole  argument  not  on  death  but  on  birth. 

Like  Wordsworth,  Denton  immediately  proceeds  with 
his  argument  by  discussing  the  influence  of  the  body  on  the 
re-awakened  soul. 

This  fibrous  frame  by  nature's  kindly  law, 

Which  gives  each  joy  to  keen  sensation  here, 
O'er  purer  scenes  of  bliss  the  veil  may  draw, 

And  cloud  reflection's  more  exalted  sphere. 
When  Death's  cold  hand  with  all  dissolving  power 

Shall  the  close  tie  with  friendly  stroke  unbind, 
Alike  our  mortal  as  our  natal  hour 

May  to  new  being  raise  the  waking  mind : 
On  death's  new  genial  day  the  soul  may  rise, 
Born  to  some  higher  life,  and  hail  some  brighter  skies. 

Wordsworth  enriches  this  and  makes  it  specific  in 

Shades  of  the  prison-house  begin  to  close 
Upon  the  growing  Boy. 

He  focuses  his  thought  on  the  child,  whereas  Denton  al- 
ways approaches  with  reverse  emphasis,  his  purpose  being 
to  prove  immortality  after  death,  at  which  time  the  soul 
will  again  be  re-awakened. 

In  lines  that  precede  those  on  birth,  Denton  also  refers 
to  the  stages  of  the  child's  development.  In  Denton's  lines 
Wordsworth  might  well  have  found  certain  headings  for  his 
development  in  the  Ode. 

See  man,  by  varied  periods  fixt  by  fate, 

Ascend  perfection's  scale  by  slow  degree: 
The  plant-like  foetus  quits  its  senseless  state. 

And  helpless  hangs  sweet-smiling  on  the  knee ; 
Soon  outward  objects  steal  into  the  brain, 

Next  prattling  childhood  lisps  with  mimic  air, 
Then  mem'ry  links  her  fleet  ideal  train, 

And  sober  reason  rises  to  compare. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  389 

The  full-grown  breast  some  manly  passion  warms, 
It  pants  for  glory's  meed,  or  beats  to  love's  alarms. 
Then  say,  since  nature's  high  behest  appears 

That  living  forms  should  change  of  being  prove, 
In  which  new  joy  the  novel  scene  endears, 

New  objects  rise  to  please,  new  wings  to  move; 
Since  man  too,  taught  by  sage  experience,  knows 

His  frame  revolving  treads  life's  varying  stage, 
That  the  man-plant  first  vegetating  grows, 

Then  sense  directs,  then  reason  rules  in  age.  .    .    . 

Denton's  poem,  then,  differs  from  the  Ode  in  that  it 
emphasizes  immortality  after  death ;  in  that  the  passages 
which  are  suggestive  of  Wordsworth's  argument  do  not 
appear  in  the  same  sequence  as  in  the  Ode;  and  in  that  his 
phrasing  is  conventional.  Yet  Wordsworth,  brooding  over 
the  loss  of  the  freshness  of  the  ''gleam, "  and  striving  to  find 
a  philosophical  basis  for  his  exaltation  of  childhood,  could 
have  found  in  Pre-Existence  and  in  Denton's  Immortality 
suggestions  for  his  backward  look  beyond  the  birth  of  the 
child.  1 

The  differences  between  Wordsworth's  emotional  lines 
and  the  colder  reasonings  of  the  earlier  poets  are  evident 
from  a  comparison  with  the  third  book  of  Prior's  Solomon, 
which  in  certain  respects  offers  parallels  conceived  in  the 
mood  of  the  early  eighteenth  century. 

Prior  is  disturbed  by  the  problem  of  earthly  existence 
in  relation  to  immortality.  His  colorless  lines  read  like 
versified  philosophy. 

1  In  Night  Thoughts  Young  writes: 
God's  image  disinherited  of  day. 
Here,  plunged  in  mines,  forgets  a  sun  was  made. 
And  again : 

Death  but  entombs  the  body,  life  the  soul. 
Young  is  concerned  with  Death,  his  thesis  being  that  death  is  the 
great  liberator. 


390  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Come,  then,  my  soul;  I  call  thee  by  that  name, 
Thou  busy  thing,  from  whence  I  know  I  am. 
* 

But  how  cam'st  thou  to  be,  or  whence  thy  spring? 
* 

Or,  if  thy  great  existence  would  inspire 
To  causes  more  sublime,  of  heavenly  fire 
Wert  thou  a  spark  struck  off,  a  separate  ray, 
Ordained  to  mingle  with  terrestrial  clay. 

He  finds  upon  reflection  that  he  came  forth  "naked"  and 
must  again  lie  "naked"  in  the  tomb ;  he  uses  the  word  again 
in  "helpless  and  naked,  on  a  woman's  knees."  Prior  is  in 
a  questioning  mood.  Wordsworth  is  not  in  doubt ;  he  has  a 
positive  vision,  expressed  in  imagery  born  of  deep  emo- 
tional faith : 

Our  birth  is  but  a  sleep  and  a  forgetting: 
The    Soul    that    rises    with   us,   our   life's    Star, 

Hath  had  elsewhere  its  setting. 
And  Cometh  from  afar: 

Not  in  entire  forgetfulness, 

And  not  in  utter  nakedness, 
But  trailing  clouds   of   glory   do   we  come 

From  God,  who  is  our  home. 

It  was  common  enough  before  Wordsworth  to  write  of 
human  life  as  spent  on  an  island  or  an  isthmus.  The  idea 
that  man  looked  across  vast  spaces,  best  expressed  in  terms 
of  the  illimitable  ocean,  was  congenial  to  poets.  Cowper 
wrote  in  Retirement: 

Opening  the  map  of  God's  extensive  plan, 
We  find  a  little  isle,  this  life  of  man. 

William  Thompson  had  written  in  Sickness  (Book  IV,  The 
Recovery), 

While   on   this    isthmus   of  my   fate   I  lie, 
Jutting  into  Eternity's  wide  sea. 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  391 

In  the  Essay  on  Man,  Pope  wrote, 

Placed  on  this  isthmus  of  a  middle  state. 

Prior  c^ave  the  same  thouci^ht  a  different  emphasis: 

Amid  two  seas,  on  one  small  point  of  land, 

Weary'd,  uncertain,  and  amazed,  we  stand : 

On  either  side  our  thoughts  incessant  turn ; 

Forward  we  dread,  and  looking  back  we  mourn; 

Losing  the  present  in  this  dubious  haste, 

And  lost  ourselves  betwixt  the   future  and  the  past. 

Wordsworth's  lines  in  The  Prelude  more  definitely  shape 
the  thought,  and  are  suggestive  of  his  attitude  in  the  Ode. 

not  less  a  tract 
Of   the    same    isthmus,    which    our    spirits   cross 
In  progress  from  their  native  continent 
To  earth  and  human  life.  (V,  535-538) 

In  the  Ode,  Wordsworth's  sonorous  lines  have  clothed  this 
thought  with  flesh  and  blood.  Wordsworth  has,  moreover, 
definitely  connected  his  lines  with  childhood. 

Hence    in   a   season   of   calm   weather 
Though  inland  far  we  be. 
Our  Souls  have  sight  of  that  immortal  sea 
Which  brought  us  hither. 
Can  in  a  moment  travel  thither. 
And  see  the  Children  sport  upon  the  shore, 
And   hear  the    mighty   waters   rolling  evermore. 

There  is  also  a  vast  difference  between  the  nature  pas- 
sages of  Prior  and  Wordsworth.  Prior  is  impersonal  and 
cold: 

From  his  first  fountain  and  beginning  ouze, 
Down  to  the  sea  each  brook  and  torrent  flows. 

Wordsworth,  a  century  later,  gives  expression  to  personal 
love  and  observation : 


392  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

I   love   the   brooks   which   down   their   channels   fret, 
Even  more  than  when  I  tripped  lightly  as  they. 

Even  when  Prior  is  personal,  he  is  colorless : 

Each    evening    I    behold    the    setting    Sun, 
With  downward  speed  into  the  Ocean  run. 

Wordsworth's  brooding  spirit  identifies  itself  with  the 
powers  of  nature : 

The  Clouds  that  gather  round   the  setting  sun 
Do  take  a  sober  colouring  from  an  eye 
That  hath  kept  watch  o'er  man's  mortality. 

At  the  close  of  Solomon,  Prior  breaks  into  a  song  of 
praise,  but  his  imagery  is  conventional : 

I  said; — and  instant  bad  the  priests  prepare 
The  ritual  sacrifice  and  solemn  prayer. 
Select  from  vulgar  herds,  with  garlands  gay, 
A  hundred  bulls  ascend  the  way. 
The  artful  youth  proceed  to  form  the  choir ; 
They  breathe  the  flute,  or  strike  the  vocal  wire. 
The  maids  in  comely  order  next  advance ; 
They  beat  the  timbrel,  and  instruct  the  dance. 

There  is  a  vast  difference  between  this  early  eighteenth- 
century  statement  and  Wordsworth's  naturalistic  fervor  a 
century  later.  Though  there  is  a  faint  suggestion  of  the 
biblical  language  used  by  Prior,  who  was  writing  with  the 
biblical  account  as  his  primary  source,  Wordsworth  sings 
his  song  of  praise  in  terms  of  the  naturalistic  school : 

Then  sing,  ye  Birds,  sing,  sing  a  joyous  song! 

And  let  the  young  Lambs  bound 

As  to  the  tabor's  sound ! 
We  in  thought  will  join  your  throng, 

Ye  that  pipe  and  ye  that  play, 

Ye  that  through  your  hearts  today 

Feel  the  gladness  of  the  May! 
What  though  the  radiance  which  was  once  so  bright 
Be  now  forever  taken  from  my  sight, 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  393 

Though  nothing  can  bring  back  the  hour 
Of  splendour   in  the  grass,  of  glory  in  the  flower; 
We  will  grieve  not,  rather  find 
Strength  in  what  remains  behind; 
In  the  primal   sympathy 
Which  having  been  must  ever  be. 

Unlike  eighteenth-century  poets  like  Gray,  Beattie,  Isaac 
Hawkins  Browne,  and  others  who  wrote  in  imitation  of 
Milton,  and  who  could  see  no  way  out  of  the  melancholy 
induced  by  contemplation  of  the  difference  between  age  and 
youth,  Wordsworth  catches  at  least  temporarily  the  consol- 
ing gleam.  He  carries  over  the  gloomier  conception  of  the 
earfier  poets  only  to  protest  against  it  and  to  triumph  over  it. 
In  the  eighteenth  century  there  are  numerous  hymns 
and  odes  to  health ;  but  all  have  to  do  with  physical  joy  or 
its  loss.  Only  occasionally  is  the  matter  connected  defi- 
nitely with  childhood.  Wordsworth's  power  to  take  the 
cruder  conceptions  of  minor  versifiers  and  suflfuse  them 
with  spiritual  suggestions  is  obvious  when  his  lines  are  read 
with  those  in  Isaac  Hawkins  Browne's  Ode  to  Health. 
Browne  calls  upon  ''rosy  Health"  to  return  and  be 

Indulgent  now  as  once  you  smiled, 
In  golden  Youth's  propitious  May, 
When  jocund  danced  my  hours  away, 
With  love,  and  joy,  and  rapture  blest, 
And    thou    wast    there    to   crown    the    rest. 

His  poem  is  a  curious  jumble  of  pagan  and  ascetic  ideals. 
With  one  eye  on  Milton,  and  the  other  on  nature,  he  is  not 
successful  in  phrasing  a  clear-cut  development  of  his  theme. 
In  the  closing  stanzas,  however,  while  he  is  contemplating 
nature  in  spring,  Browne  pauses  long  enough  to  realize  his 
sense  of  something  lost  between  youth  and  old  age: 


394  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

Through   every   form   of   mystic   birth, 
The  swarming  air,  the   teeming  earth, 
Through  all  the  fruitful  deep  contains, 
Thy  sovereign  vital  influence  reigns, 
Mixes,  ferments,  inspires  the  whole, 
Pours  the  glad  warmth,  the  genial  soul, 
Breathes  in  the  breeze,  distils  in  showers. 
Swells  the  young  bud,  and  wakes  the  flowers: 
With  livelier  green  the  herbage  springs, 
The  violet  blow^s,  the  linnet  sings, 
Its  richest  colouring  Nature  wears. 
And  Pleasure  leads  the  wanton  years. 

This  merely  reminds  him  that  he  can  not  regain  the  health 

of  his  childhood: 

O!  see  I  pine  distressed,  forlorn. 
And   seek   in   vain   thy  wished   return. 

Certain  lines  in  the  Ode  and  in  Langhorne's  To  the  River 
Eden  (1759)  emphasize  an  essential  difference  in  power  of 
insight  and  phrasing.  Both  poets  were  occupied  with  the 
recollection  of  childhood  in  the  presence  of  natural  objects, 
and  both  definitely  reacted  to  their  inability  in  later  years  to 
identify  themselves  with  nature  as  fully  as  in  the  days  of 
childhood.  Langhorne  is  almost  wholly  external  and  de- 
scriptive, and  hardly  feels  the  later  poet's  identity  of  self 
with  nature.  ;He  came  so  close,  however,  to  Wordsworth's 
mood  that  it  is  not  surprising  to  find  that  Wordsworth 
thought  very  highly  of  Langhorne's  poetry.  Langhorne 
would  have  the  "maids  of  Memory"  waken  recollections  of 
the  days  when  Nature  impressed  "her  image  on  my  mind." 
There  still  come  to  him  flashes  of  the  old  delight  in  nature. 
In  the  tree  beside  his  favorite  stream  he  once  again  finds  a 
congenial  stimulus : 

The  poplar  tall,  that  waving  near 

Would  whisper  to  thy  murmurs  free; 

Yet  rustling  seems  to  soothe  mine  ear. 
And  trembles  when  I  sigh  for  thee. 


\ 


WILLIAM    WORDSWORTH  395 

Like  Wordsworth  j^r  ^-^-^^'T^g  tha^  hf  can  not  live  over  a^ain 
the  joys  of  childhood  : 

In    vain — the    maids   of    Memory    fair 
No  more  in  golden  visions  play. 

His  visions  are  of  play  hours,  friendship,  and  love  ("No 
Delia's  smile  approves  my  lay").  He  is  sorrowful  not  so 
much  becn^use  he  mi^g^g  g^nipt^hing  jn  nature7as~B€cause~^ 
can  not  reproduce  the  jovs  of  his  childhood.  Like  browifTe 
fie  is  sighing  for  a  return  of  palpable  pleasures  enjoyed  in 
the  presence  of  nature. 

Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  is  momentarily  moved 
to  sorrow  because  his  visions  have  to  do  with  spiritual  mat- 
ters. He  is  searchino;  for  the  "gleam'l  in  nature  itself 
He  can  no  longer  sustain  the  impression  of  a  subtle  power 
to  whichTejxspoiided^pontaneously  io^chUdhood.  His  mis- 
•givings  are  precipitated  and  crystallized  when  he  looks  upon 
familiar  objects  which  no  longer  as  in  boyhood  sustain  the 
mood  for  which  he  longs. 

But  there's  a  Tree,  of  many,  one, 
A  single  Field  which  I  have  looked  upon, 
Both  of  them  speak  of  something  that  is  gone: 

The   Pansy  at  my  feet 

Doth  the  same  tale  repeat : 
Whither  is  fled   the  visionary  gleam? 
Where  is  it  now,  the  glory  and  the  dream? 

Although  Wordsworth  gave  fullest  expression  to  their 
conception,  there  is,  then,  an  essential  dilTerence  between 
him  and  those  poets  who  had  written  feelingly  of  nature  and 
childhood.  This  lies  first  in  thej^wer  to  mnvey  Vilg  ^f-ru^^ 
of  the  "gleam."  And  secondly,  although  moved  to  grief 
over  loss,  he  does  not  feel  that  the  loss  is  complete,  so  that 
he  is  thanktul  for  what  remains.  He  added,  furthermore, 
the   thought    of   rr}nfinnniig   Bje.\'\frnr^      After    tracing    the 


396  ENGLISH    CHILDHOOD 

foul's  coming  in  traiJing  clouds  of  glory,  he  exalts  the 
child  in  a  passage  that  carries  to  its  inevitable  conclusion 
the  conception  for  which  poets  had  been  groping  since 
Shaftesbury  and  Thomson.  Many  readers  are  doubtful 
whether  the  passage  should,  or  even  can,  be  literally  inter- 
preted. Nevertheless,  it  truly  represents  the  highest  poetic 
flight  in  the  spirit  of  those  poets  who  down  through  the 
eighteenth  century  had  looked jipon  the  child  wi'th_jnprpas-_ 
ing  aflPection,  understaLndjng,  and  reverence^ 

Thou,  whose  exterior  semblance  doth  belie 

Thy  Soul's  immensity; 
Thou  best  Philosopher,  who  yet  dost  keep 
Thy  heritage,  thou  Eye  among  the  blind, 
That,  deaf  and  silent,  read'st  the  eternal  deep, 
Haunted  for  ever  by  the  eternal  mind, — 

Mighty  Prophet!     Seer  blest! 

On  whom  those  truths  do  rest, 
Which  we  are  toiling  all  our  lives  to  find. 
In  darkness  lost,  the  darkness  of  the  grave; 
Thou,   over  whom  thy  Immortality 
Broods  like  the  Day,  a  Master  o'er  a  Slave, 

A  Presence  which  is  not  to  be  put  by; 

* 

Thou  little  Child,  yet  glorious  in  the  might 

Of  heaven-born  freedom  on  thy  being's  height. 

Why  with  such  earnest  pains  dost  thou  provoke 

The  years  to  bring  the  inevitable  yoke, 

Thus  blindly  with  thy  blessedness  at  strife? 

Full   soon  thy   Soul   shall   have   her   earthly  freight, 

And  custom  lie  upon  thee  with  a  weight, 

Heavy  as  frost,  and  deep  almost  as  life ! 


INDEX 


Age.  of  children,  poets  on,  2 — 6. 

304. 
Akenside,  Mark.  89.  94—95,  113. 

234,  299.  m.  378. 
Animals,  7,  21.  24,  36.  99ff..  262ff. 

Barbauld,  A.  L.,  258—259.  287. 

Beattie,  James.  The  Minstrel,  3. 
40.  70.  71,  75,  104—105,  158, 
237—238.  376,  378.  381,  393; 
Lord  Hay.  31—32,  327. 

Benevolence,  universal,  animals, 
96ff.,  (see  also  Blake,  Shaftes- 
bury, and  Wordsworth). 

Berkeley.  Bishop.  217.  370. 

Blackstone,  William.  78. 

Blair,  Robert.  58—59.  111.  331. 
333,  336,  337,  338. 

Blake,  William,  262—298.  1.  43. 
65,  66,  127.  149,  200,  219.  220, 
234,  259,  261.  314,  339,  340. 
349,  351,  353,  357,  373,  379, 
383;  children  of  the  poor.  270. 
272,  274.  278,  282.  286.  287; 
Christian  terminolog\-,  293 ; 
ideal  happiness,  65.  282 — 283. 
291,  296,  301;  indebtedness  to 
eighteenth  century,  262ff.,  268, 
276,  281,  283,  295,  299;  natural 
desires,  273.  275.  284.  292,  293. 
294;  not  sectarian,  267;  publi- 
cations for  children,  264;  re- 
verence  for  child   nature,   277. 


278.  279,  285.  291:  simple 
language.  266;  universal  be- 
nevolence. 267.  272.  274,  278, 
282,  286,  287;  Wordsworth, 
on,  300.  (See  also  Shaftes- 
bury. Rousseau,  Animals,  Re- 
volution.) 

Bloomfield,  Robert.  81,  249. 

Browne.  Isaac  Hawkins,  387.  393, 
395. 

Bruce.  Michael,  Daphnis,  84; 
Fountain,  To  a,  84;  Lochleven, 
51.  65,  71,  82,  93,  158.  163,  241, 
354.  377,  378;  Lochleven  No 
More,  78;  Spring,  Elegy  to, 
105;  Wordsworth.  75.  87,  92, 
94. 

Burns.  Robert,  Address  to  Beel- 
zebub, 135;  Auld  Lang  Syne, 
59,  83;  Ayr,  77;  Birth  of  a 
Posthumous  Child,  40.  42; 
Bonie  Jean.  103;  Bonnie  Lad 
That's  Far  Aiva,  40;  Cotter's 
Saturday  -  Night,  131  —  134, 
158.  159;  Cruel  are  the  Par- 
ents, 103;  Miss  Cruickshank, 
40.  42;  Death  and  Dr.  Horn- 
book, 196;  Iventory,  241;  Man 
Was  Made  to  Mourn,  134; 
Michie,  Epitaph  on  William, 
197;  Mouse,  To  a,  105,  282; 
Ran  tin  Dog,  the  Daddie  O't, 
40:    Rose-Bud    By    My    Early 


398 


INDEX 


Walk,  40,  41 ;  Ruined  Farmer, 
130;  Sensibility,  102;  Stella, 
Elegy  on,  79;  Welcome  to  his 
Love-begotten  Daughter,  39; 
Wounded  Hare,  105 ;— Blake, 
and,  266,  281,  283;  predeces- 
sors, and,  305. 
Byrom,  John,  175,  176,  197,  211, 
256. 

Cawthorn,  James,  31,  176 — 177, 
192,  210,  213,  243. 

Chap  books,  236ff.,  243fif. 

Chatterton,  Thomas,  63,  77,  112, 
154,  163,  194.  208,  243. 

Children  in  the  Wood,  119,  234— 
238,  246. 

Churchill,  Charles,  182,  190. 

Coleridge.  Samuel  Taylor,  49,  90, 
103,  104,  136,  288,  308,  309,  314, 
320,  350.  351,  356. 

Collins,  William,  84,  89—90.  91, 
93,  113—114,  233,  239. 

Cooper,  John  Gilbert,  22.  91,  162, 
232,  327. 

Cotton,  Nathaniel,  97,  101,  232, 
280. 

Cowper,  William,  Anne  Bodham, 
To  My  Cousin,  2,  3;  Blake, 
and,  266;  Conversation,  185, 
246;  Dyer,  and,  140,  141,  158; 
Error,  The  Progress  of,  208; 
Hope,  31,  208;  John  Gilpin,  63; 
Mother's  Picture,  On  the  Re- 
ceipt of  My,  43,  44,  347;  Ode, 
129 ;  On  Observing  some 
Names,  15;  Retirement,  56, 
390;  Table  Talk,  31,  180;  Task, 
The,  55,  126,  128,  149,  370; 
Thurlow,  Edward,  81 ;  Tiroci- 


nium, 161,  174,  181,  184,  185— 
189,  192,  255,  271;  Truth,  127; 
Valediction,  208;  Warren 
Hastings,  To,  81 ;  Wordsworth, 
and,  53,  71,  72,  106,  129,  130, 
372;  Lines  on  a  Sleeping  In- 
fant, 304. 
Crabbe,  George,  Borough,  The, 
204,  205 ;  Parish  Register,  The, 
148,  149,  154,  195,  204,  246, 
250,  299;  Village,  The,  64,  77, 
112,  140,  146,  147,  148,  150, 
151,  158,  159,  271,  367,  373,  374. 

Denton,  Thomas.  387—389. 
Dyer.  John,  2,  56.  139—144,  146, 
147,  152,  153,  158,  159,  190. 

Flogging,  208ff. 

Gay,  John,  13,  22—23,  110,  139, 
197,  234,  235—236,  237,  239. 
355,  373,  374. 

Goldsmith,  Oliver,  65,  77,  112, 
144—146,  158,  184,  190,  193, 
202—203,  204,  241,  251,  253, 
254. 

Graeme,  James,  71,  73,  81 — 82, 
109,  178,  210. 

Grahame,  James,  160,  233,  366 — 
367,  371—372. 

Gray,  Thomas,  31,  51,  59,  66 — 67, 
77,  93,  94,  191,  234,  284,  325, 
337,    338,    381—382,    393. 

Hamilton,  William,   115—116. 
Harte,  Walter,  27—28. 
Headley,    Henry,    118—119,    271. 
Henley,  William,  47. 
Hill,  Aaron,  4,  5,  24,  25,  122—123. 


INDEX 


399 


Hoyland,  Francis.  32—33,  39.  51. 
54.  69. 

Industrial     Revolution.     2.    99ff.. 

138ff.,  156.  160. 
Industry,    The    House    of,    142ff.. 

374. 

Jago,   Richard,  71,  73,  82,   182— 

183.  201.  205,  329—330. 
Jerningham,      Edward,      37 — 38, 

119—121,  271. 
Johnson,    Samuel,    78,    175,    180, 

184,  207,  210,  223,  233.  234,  248, 
249,  251,  253. 

Johnson.  S..  (of  Shrewsbury), 
211—216. 

Lamb,  Charles  and  Mary,  50,  54, 
57,  62,  77,  88-^9,  127.  203, 
234,  238,  260,  261.  264.  280, 
288.  318,  351,  373. 

Langhorne,  John,  Eden,  To  the, 
92.  394;  Enlargement  of  the 
Mind,  15,  291 ;  Genius  of  West- 
moreland, 92;  Irzvan,  Farewell 
Hymn  to  the  Valley  of,  92; 
Owen  of  Carron,  23;  Ponte- 
fract  Castle,  Ruins  of.  330; 
Wordsworth,  and,  91.  92,  93, 
355,  394. 

Lloyd,  Robert,  15,  29—30.  177— 
178.  183.  190,  194,  205. 

Locke.  John,  1,  25,  37,  144.  161, 
165,  166,  167,  169,  171,  181, 
184,  223. 

Logan,  John,  78,  87. 

Lovibond,  Edward,  31,  51,  69 — 
70,  75,  90,  103—104,  109,  205— 
207,  217,  281,  282,  328,  254,  278. 


Lyttleton,  Lord,  33,  103.  234  . 

Mackenzie.  Henry,   111.  144.  233, 

241.  381. 
Mason.  William,  38.  61.  91.   103, 

163,  210.  238. 
Mickle,    William    Julius,    5.    60, 

61,  62.  65.  66.   70,  72,   73,  79. 

86,  150,  163,  240.  354. 
More,  Hannah,  137,  150fT..  156— 

157,   191,  361. 
Mother  Goose,  254. 

Native  fields,  76 — 96,  (see  also 
Akenside,  Bruce.  Collins, 
Wordsworth). 

Newberry.  John.  173.  219,  251ff.. 
264,  266.  351. 

Philips,   Ambrose.    19—22. 

Philipps,  John.  11—12.  15,  51. 
229. 

Pope,  Alexander,  19,  189.  327; 
Dunciad,  The,  161.  164—166, 
169,  172,  174,  175,  205,  209, 
210,  211,  214,  216,  270,  271; 
Essay  on  Man,  12,  391 ;  Mes- 
siah, The,  12 — 13;  his  mother, 
25,  44. 

Pre-Existence,  A  Poem  in  Imi- 
tation of  Milton,  377,  384—386. 
389. 

Prior,  Matthew,  2.  15.  16—18,  41, 
44,  49.  176.  190.  191,  192,  220, 
299,  308.  310,  311.  320.  378, 
387.  389—392. 

Revolution,  French,  The,  47,  99, 
134-136,  151.  270,  272,  274, 
276,  291,  243ff. 


400 


INDEX 


Robinson  Crusoe,  246,  247,  249 — 
250,  253. 

Rousseau.  Jean  Jacques,  1,  3,  34, 
48,  87.  99,  103,  107,  120,  161, 
171.  173,  207,  212,  213,  214,  215, 
216,  250,  255,  256,  260,  261,  270, 
271,  277,  278,  346,  348,  349, 
350.  358. 

Russell,  Thomas,  27,  128—129. 


396;  his  mother,  26—27,  43; 
Spring,  25,  279;  Summer,  52, 
55,  57,  58,  110,  115;  Autumn, 
110;  Winter,  60,  102,  110—111, 
239;  Liberty,  112—113,  164. 

Thompson,  William,  13,  390. 

Tickell,  Thomas,  108—109,  190, 
234,  239—240,  299—300;  Horn- 
Book,  192—193,  197. 


Savage,  Richard,  114 — 115. 
Scott,  John,  (of  Amwell),  20,  34, 

51,  52.  54,  56,  67—68,  75,  77, 

89,  103,  109,  116,  129—130,  140, 

141. 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  147,  292,  300, 

301. 
Shaftesbury,      Anthony      Ashley 

Cooper,  Earl  of,  1,  98—99,  105, 

106,  129,  184.  278,  291,  298,  346, 

358,  378,  396;  (See  also  Blake, 

Wordsworth). 
Shaw,  Cuthbert,  34—36,  39,  103. 
Shenstone.    William,    23,    51,    61, 

62,  63,  68,  79,  82,  182,  196.  197— 

202,  203,  204,  234,  282,  372. 
Somerville,   William,   30,  61,   66, 

73,  80,  100,  101—102.  104,  116, 

209,  210,  249,  256. 
Southey,  Robert,  79,  82—83,  87— 

88,  95,  106—107,  118,  136—138, 

158,  290,  299,  344. 

Swift,  Jonathan,  28,  29,  63,  80— 
81,  89,  175,  195,  220,  234.  235, 
247,  249,  372. 

Thomson,  James,  39,  51,  67,  91, 
92,  94,   97,   98.    100.    106,    117, 

159,  241,  269,  276,  278,  281.  291, 
312,  314,  317,  327,  343,  344,  381, 


Warton,  Joseph,  Fashion,  37, 
100,  103;  Library,  109;  To 
Fancy,  330. 

Warton,  Thomas,  47,  75,  91,  178, 
234,  308,  377. 

Watts,  Isaac,  3,  42,  101,  216—217, 
219,  220—230,  257,  258,  261, 
264,  266,  267,  287,  294,  308. 

West,  Gilbert,  Education,  62 
166—169,  174,  189,  208,  271 

White,  H.  K.,  51,  54,  64—65,  68, 
119,  121—122,  156,  195,  199, 
203—204,  238,  242—243,  246, 
249,  325,  326,  328—329. 

Whitehead,  William,  28,  109,  207. 

Winchilsea,  Lady,  23—24. 

Wordsworth,  Dorothy,  46,  292, 
304,  305,  307,  308,  312,  329, 
345,  358,  359,  375,  378. 

Wordsworth,  William,  children, 
age  of,  3,  4,  5 ;  and  Blake,  262, 
299,  300,  301,  302,  339,  340,  349, 
351.  357;  benevolence.  103,  130, 
276,  344ff. ;  baptism,  307 ;  birth, 
38,  44ff.,  306—307;  books  and 
reading,  234,  237,  239.  244,  247, 
248,  250,  251,  260,  261,  349ff.; 
chap  books,  244;  childliood  the, 

fr>nnHntjn^-|     pf    hi';    philnsnphv. 

164,  302,  3l4,  344,' 382^.';  child- 


NDEX 


401 


less  marriage,  23;  children  of 
the  poor.  52.  56.  97,  137,  139. 
144.  147,  151,  306.  313.  317. 
343ff,  (See  also  Industry)  ; 
Children  in  the  Wood,  234, 
237;  Christmas.  306,  323.  324; 
city  children.  314 — 324;  con- 
firmation. 5.  6;  education,  62, 
69,  72fif.,  191,  216.  217,  260,  261, 
299,  300.  302.  348.  361.  368. 
369;  grandchildren.  64,  303; 
graves  of  children,  325 — 327  ; 
happiness  of  children.  313; 
Hawkeshead,  55.  62,  151,  164. 
303.  Z22,  325.  334.  354;  House 
of  Industry,  144,  160;  Immor- 
tality, 341,  374ff.,  see  also  Ode; 
Industry,  361—374;  Jack  the 
Giant-Killer,  322,  352;  lulla- 
bies. 42,  43,  308  (see  also  Blake, 
Watts.  Dorothy  Wordsworth, 
Coleridge,  and  T.  Warton)  ; 
medieval  elements,  2>27 — 331 ; 
model  child.  350;  mother,  43. 
44,  346,  347,  352,  353,  356,  see 
also  Cowper,  Langhorne,  and 
Thomson;  native  fields,  51, 
59ff..  76,  78,  79.  89.  91,  94.  96. 
318.  342,  343,  344.  376ff.,  382; 
naturalistic  supernaturalism, 
334-338,  see  also^  74.  76 ;  J^oeL 
of  childhood.  299^.302^  pravers. 


309;  Revolution,  French.  47. 
343flF.,  369.  see  also  Blake, 
Rousseau,  Shaftesbury;  Rous- 
seau, 87,  346,  348,  349.  350. 
358.  see  also  Rousseau  ;  Shaf- 
tesbury. 346.  358.  378.  396.  see 
also  Shaftesbury. — Alice  fell, 
2)72—2)72,\  Jjiecdote  for  Fath- 
ers, 302.  358;  Excursion,  3.  23. 
47,  62,  73,  137.  160,  217,  237, 
250,  302,  303,  306flF. ;  Fidelity, 
282;  Foresight,  358—360.  sec 
also  53;  Idle  Shef^herd-Boys, 
56 — 57;  Kitten  and  the  Falling 
Leqzrsy  282.  309.  310;  Liicv^ 
M3.  364:  Michael.  3,  4.  44,  45. 
56.  303.  341.  342.  345;  Oak  and 
the  Broom,  S3:  Ode.  In 
tions^.JA^.  291.  3W.  M. 
'^A  '  jST  J^gZ^-^Q^,  see 
also  Immortality;  Pet  Lamb, 
2S2:~Prerude,  4.  59—61,  62.  65, 
69.  72—76,  78.  87.  89.  91.  94.  96. 
130.  234,  244.  248.  299.  300.  301. 
302,  303ff.,  348—357;  Sf>ar- 
row's  Nest,  83,  84;  Stepping- 
Stones,  59;  There  was  a  boy, 
5;  To  H.  C,  47—49;  IVe  are 
Seven,  286.  302.  338—341. 

Young.   Edward.  232.   233,  .380— 
381.  387.   389. 


VITA 

I  was  born  on  January  19,  1883,  in  Wilson,  Minnesota. 
My  father,  who  was  at  that  time  a  clergyman,  was  born  in 
Columbus,  Wisconsin,  and  my  mother  (nee  Gise)  in  Al- 
bany, New  York.  After  attending  the  public  schools,  I 
studied  in  the  classical  course  at  Northwestern  College,  re- 
ceiving the  A.  B.  in  1904.  From  1904  to  1906  I  attended 
lectures  in  the  Graduate  School  at  Harvard  University  under 
Professors  G.  P.  Baker,  G.  L.  Kittredge,  F.  N.  Robinson,  W. 
H.  Schofield,  and  Barrett  Wendell,  receiving  the  A.  M.  in 
June,  1906.  From  1906  to  19 19  I  taught  in  the  Department 
of  English,  Syracuse  University,  Syracuse,  N.  Y.  I  was  in- 
structor from  1906  to  1909,  Assistant  Professor  from  1909 
to  1912,  Associate  Professor  from  1912  to  1915,  and  Pro- 
fessor of  English  from  19 15  to  19 19.  In  the  summer  of 
1919  and  during  the  academic  year  1919 — 'I920  I  was  on 
leave  of  absence  as  a  resident  student  in  the  Graduate  School 
of  Columbia  University.  During  this  time  I  attended  the 
Seminar  conducted  by  Professor  A.  H.  Thorndike,  and  also 
lectures  under  Professors  C.  S.  Baldwin,  G.  P.  Krapp,  W. 
W.  Lawrence,  A.  H.  Thorndike,  W.  P.  Trent,  and  E,  H. 
Wright.  In  the  spring  of  1920  I  resigned  my  professor- 
ship at  Syracuse  University,  and  became  an  Instructor  in 
English  in  University  Extension,  Columbia  University.  I 
have  published  a  syllabus  for  use  in  a  freshman  course  in 
English  composition,  another  for  a  sophomore  course  in 
English  literature,  and  have  written  two  articles  for  the 
Bulletin  of  the  Society  for  the  Promotion  of  Engineering 
Education. 


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FORM  NO.  DD6,  60m,   1/83           BERKELEY,  CA  94720 

(g)$ 

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U.C.  BERKELEY  LIBRARIES 


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THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA  LIBRARY 


